Stop Overexplaining: Storytelling Lessons from Robot Chicken with Mike Fasolo

"The idea is the spark, but the story is what happens after the fire starts." 

It's easy to have an idea. It's much harder to turn that idea into something people want to watch, read, or listen to. 

In this episode, host Matt Pierce sits down with Emmy‑winning Robot Chicken writer, novelist, and podcaster Mike Fasolo to talk about storytelling. They cover how to hook an audience fast and when to trust them to fill in gaps themselves. 

Mike also shares how he cuts long-form livestreams down into short, punchy clips without losing the story, and what it takes to move from "I have an idea" to "I made the thing." 

Key learning points: 

• Mike's approach to storytelling is to get in as fast as possible - skip the setup, find the hook, tell the story, and move on, trusting the audience to pick up on what's happening without it being spelled out. 
• An idea on its own isn't a story. It becomes one when you find your character, work out what they want, put an obstacle in front of them, and make sure the outcome matters to the audience. 
• When cutting a long video down into something short, Mike looks for what's most engaging to him first, then finds a cut point that works like a cliff-hanger, giving viewers just enough to want to keep watching. 

Important links and mentions: 

• Connect with Mike Fasolo on LinkedIn
• Connect with Mike Fasolo on Instagram
• Mike's personal website
• Mike's weekly live stream on the craft and business of making comics, co-hosted with Buddy Scalera - Comic Book School 

Transcript

Mike 0:00

If you have an idea, if you have something that you want to do, sit down and do it. I mean, it takes a lot of effort, it takes a lot of stress, but the thing is, if it's, you know, kind of like one of those little brain worms and it keeps poking at you, then it really needs to come out. So don't just sit on it and say, oh, I'll do it later. Sit down, take your time, and get it down so everybody can share whatever it is that's floating around in your head.

Matt 0:32

Good morning, good evening, good afternoon, wherever you are and wherever you're watching from. My name is Matt Pierce. And today we're gonna be having an awesome conversation. We're gonna be talking with a creator who has a lot of interesting experiences that I'll let him share a little bit about, but uh, we're gonna be talking about story, we're gonna be talking about writing, we're gonna be talking about how we can use video to communicate ideas, and it's gonna be fantastic. So I want to uh jump right in here with our guest today, Mikeolo. So welcome, Mike, to the Visual Lounge. Glad that you're here. Oh, thanks for having me.

What is Robot Chicken?

Matt 1:03

So so, Mike, you've actually uh got a pretty distinguished career. Uh what would you tell us about it? Like that you're you're you know, you got your you got dogs and you like writing? Is that is that the gist of it?

Mike 1:16

That pretty much covers the whole thing, yeah. Um uh probably my biggest uh credit is robot chicken. I worked on robot chicken for geez, close to 20 years, doing doing all the writing, uh sitting in the room, making sure everything is as it should be for the show, and you know, warping children's minds as they watch the show.

Matt 1:39

So for for those who don't know, and it's uh you know, I'll be I I know there's people who don't know, but give us a high-level summary. What is Robot Chicken?

Mike 1:48

Robot Chicken, uh, it's a stop-motion animated show basically spoofing pop culture. We we touch on everything and we make fun of everything, and you know, nothing is off limits. So we just go crazy and we pull something out of the headlines and just and just run with it.

Matt 2:05

Yeah, I in in the lead up for this, I did watch a bunch of episodes. I was at work and thinking, I should probably stop because I'm gonna spend all day catching up on episodes. And so it was it's it's it's really funny, really engaging stuff, and what a what a cool thing to to

Lessons from doing public facing work

Matt 2:22

see. Um, you know, I want to talk to you a little bit about that because I imagine, you know, I'm not doing a lot of writing for TV shows. I'm not, you know, telling uh stories after story after story after story. But as a as a writer, as someone who's creating that, um, what what do you think's been the biggest kind of lesson that you've learned from working on a project, not only that has had longevity, but also has, you know, I think it has been just so public because you as soon as you're on a television network or you're on YouTube or you're wherever, it is very public work and people have people have opinions, we'll say.

Mike 2:58

Yes, people have a lot of opinions. Uh, I mean, the the biggest thing is it's really just about storytelling, you know, what what it comes down to is you wanna get the audience engaged, and especially for us, you want to make them laugh. And you want them to, as soon as the one episode is over, you want them to start clicking on the next just to see what's gonna happen, what's gonna come up, what other crazy ideas did these, you know, bunch of writers think we'd like. So yeah, it's it's it's really just about story.

Mike’s tricks for storytelling

Matt 3:29

So in your experience, because you're also, I mean, you've you've written uh you're a novelist. Um, I know you guys have you have a live stream that you're working on uh every week about talking about comic books and creating comic books, and there's again kind of that storytelling aspect. Are there things in your kind of your bag of tricks that like you found have been super helpful over the years to kind of pull out as a writer to say, like, hey, here are some things that I use to help stories become either, you know, move them along or make them more meaningful or help people to connect to them?

Mike 4:02

Well, I think the I think the biggest thing, especially learning from from, you know, sitting in the robot chicken writers room, is you have to get in as quickly as possible. You know, dragging something out, just, oh, I have to give all this background or I have to tell about all this exposition. No one wants to sit through that. They want to get into the action, they want something to happen, and then they want to get out and start the next thing. So it's, you know, it's it's like get in as fast as you can, find a hook that's gonna draw them in, and then, you know, go from there. Tell the story quickly and then get out, move on to the next thing.

Matt 4:40

So uh let me ask you because I think there's a tendency in the people I talk to, and even myself, I I find myself is like, well, but they don't understand the character, or they don't understand the the you know, like you said, the exposition, they don't leave, you know, the lead up. So um is and I don't try not to make this a yes-no question, is it like, do you just sacrifice some of that, or are there things that you do to kind of maybe weave that back in, or just say, like, hey, they're gonna pick up along the way, we're gonna trust the audience to get it.

Mike 5:09

Yeah, a lot of it is uh you have to understand that the audience is you know just as smart as you are. So they are gonna pick up on pretty much what you're trying to talk about. So I don't think you have to spend a lot of time explaining like the premise. You don't need background, you don't need stuff like that. You jump in, you give a little bit of um, you know, input for the characters in the story, and then you can just go. And the audience will get it, they will pick up on it, and then you know, it stops you from having to spend 25 minutes explaining things. Like even in the in the movies or TV shows today where they sit down with their friend or whoever and they have a 25-minute conversation about the entire background of what's happening. They don't need that. You can you can show it in little flashes, you can show it in little little clips of you know pieces of paper, whatever is that the show is about, something that clues them in, but it doesn't have to be you know a sledgehammer to the head that this is exactly what it's about. You know, get in and uh you know, just just start, just go. They will pick up on it.

Matt 6:17

Yeah, uh well, I appreciate they said that you know the audience is as smart as you. I like to think my audience is probably smarter than me most of the time. And they're they're like, why are you being so obtuse about

How to know if you are doing too much or too little

Matt 6:30

this, Matt? So um with with your work uh with thinking about comic books, there's a lot of sequencing that kind of happens in comic books and television. I'm assuming is it's a lot the same, it's just different mediums and kind of delivery mechanisms. Um you know there are also gaps there. And again, it sounds like you're just you're trusting that the audience will get it, but it does sound like you have mechanisms to to pull back in information. Um but how do you know if you've done too much or too little? Like what was the metrics you're kind of looking at when like let's say you did a show or you're in a comic book, how do you know if you've you you just didn't quite nail it? Any any advice?

Mike 7:11

Uh it's it's it is tough. I mean, comics are a different story because it's not um obviously a visual, I mean it is a visual medium, but it's not like a flowing thing. So every panel sort of has to tell their own story. So they each have a job, and that is meant to move the story along. And in the head of the readers, they're putting it all together. So you don't want to, you know, linger on anything too long unless it's absolutely necessary for the story, or else people do get bored. It's like watching, you know, a 20-minute conversation between people. You're like, I'm done, you know, I'll fast forward through this. You wanna tell, get in there and tell them exactly what needs to be said, and then and then move on. And it's kind of, I mean, I do some video editing, so it's kind of that same way. You don't want to linger on a shot too long because then people are like, okay, I get it. And you also don't want to just pop it on the screen for two seconds because then they'll be like, I didn't see what that was. It's it comes with practice, a lot of it, that you just have to get in there and see especially what works for you and and think of how the audience is gonna view it.

Matt 8:29

Yeah,

Connecting with your audience

Matt 8:30

let's can we talk about audience for a second? Because I'm assuming uh in each of the mediums that you're working you've worked in, audiences are always different, right? And like the the audience watching, let's say, Robot Chicken, probably certain demographics, you probably had access to some of that information or some understanding. Um, when you're doing treatments on whether kind of whether it's a comic book or whether it's a TV show or novel, uh, what are the key things that you're you're considering in terms of, hey, I've got an audience and I need to connect with them? Are there elements that you typically look at, or is it always different because each of those mediums are different?

Mike 9:09

It's it's always different. But I just I mean, when we were in the robot chicken writers room, it was all about what you knew. Like a big group of us were, you know, were gen Gen X. So it's we grew up with He-Man and Transformers and Smurfs and all that. So that's what we tapped into. We were writing for us, but we also had um other writers who were from from you know later on, much younger than us, 20 years younger than us. And they would write what they knew. So especially for something like that, it's you know, it is write what you know because that's what you're most tapped into, and that's what you you know know the best.

How to write when you aren’t the expert

Matt 9:50

Did did you ever find yourself in situations where like uh something scenario came up and you're like, they're like, Mike, you need to write this because you're you're the one that's got the time. And you're like, but I that's not that's not my thing. That's not my joke. That's not my thing. I don't know much about that. And how do you how do you go about doing that when you're not the maybe you're not the expert on He-Man, so you but you're asked to write the segment with it?

Mike 10:12

Uh you could either do a little bit of research, which would we would sit down and oh, I haven't seen you know, a smurst in 30 years, so I'll watch a few episodes and see if I can pick up on anything. But then other times you just go in blind and you're like, I'll just do what I can. And you try to you find just one aspect of it and you run with it. And you try to make it as funny and as stupid and as ridiculous as you can because that's what people are gonna enjoy the most. They're not gonna care that you got, you know, Papa Smurf's pants color right. They're gonna care that Papa Smurf is doing something out of his mind and making you laugh.

Matt 10:51

Well, you know, as someone who recently learned that uh the Smurfs are very big in Belgium, uh, they do care about the color of the pants.

Mike 11:00

Didn't they start off in Belgium?

Matt 11:01

I think they stuff in France. Somewhere. Yeah, one of those, I think. Uh yeah, well, I love that, right? Because I think oftentimes we're tasked with opportunities to create content that we're not, especially in the corporate world. My the audience who's probably listening to this is they're asked to make content about stuff that they're like, I don't know anything about. I, you know, I worked at a pharmaceutical for a while about, you know, health and safety of, you know, lockout, tag out. I'm like, I didn't know anything. And so um, I think I like what you're saying is sometimes you just lean in and sometimes you do so you do your research and do what you

Getting the idea beyond the ideation

Matt 11:33

can. Um, and speaking about creating content, um it does feel like that a lot of people are out there, they have ideas, right? And I think what I love about what you're doing with comic book school, you and Buddy Scalera, and and I know others are in on that project, but you had this idea and you just ran with it. Uh, how how do you help people who are like, it seems like the things you've done, it's like takes a lot of just ideas, but beyond the like the ideas are great, and but there's a million of them, but then you have to make something. What advice would you give to people who are like, I've got ideas, and they're I think they're good ideas. I just they can't get past that ideation phase.

Mike 12:12

That's always the hard part because everybody does have ideas. You can be, you know, in the shower and be like, oh my god, whatever it is, I that's a great idea. Um, I heard a I heard a quote once, I don't remember where it's from, but it was um something like the idea is the spark, but the story is what happens after the fire starts. So if you have an idea, it you need to just kind of delve into it and find the core of the idea. Like if it's about a character, whoever, whoever it is, you have to find who that character is, what they want, put an obstacle in front of them, and then make the outcome to whatever their problem is matter. So it's not just like, oh, I have an idea about a grilled cheese sandwich walking down the street. Who's the grilled cheese sandwich? Where's he going? What's he want to do? And and kind of put a little of yourself into that grilled cheese sandwich and make him come alive for everybody who's watching. So it's it's it's uh the starting is always the hard part. That's what I think everybody does because that you know, that blank screen in front of you is is tough. You just gotta, and even if it is just writing the idea down and then you know, take some time, think about it, and see where you want it to go. But yeah, getting it down is is the big part.

Matt 13:38

Yeah, it feels like uh, you know, I like the the analogy of a spark, right? When you think about building a fire, you've got the spark, and then but you have you can't just put all the wood on it, right? It's yeah, it's put put add the kindling, add the stuff to

The key to creativity

Matt 13:50

catch. Um so if you were if you were to give advice to someone who uh you know, they they they come to you and they say, Mike, I see what you're doing. You are such a creative guy. You're working on all these cool, you've worked on these cool projects, you've created all these things. I am not a creative person. Uh what it's not your job to coach them and give them their life advice, but but if you had to give them a little bit of advice and help them, maybe what what would you want them to know?

Mike 14:20

Uh well, I mean, do they does this person want to write? Do they want to, you know, do artwork? Do they just want to be there to do the editing? It all kind of depends on what they're looking to do. For writing, you know, it is just about sitting down and writing. You gotta you gotta sit down, you gotta start, and you gotta keep going. Your first draft is always gonna be terrible. So, you know, that's just something that you have to expect. Um, if you want to be an artist, I I'm terrible at art, but I've I've dabbled, you know, I've you know taken those online courses or you know, seeing what I can draw. And I'm absolutely terrible at it. But when I'm like, oh, I need to draw something, I gotta map this out in storyboards, you know, you sit down and you do it. And you just gotta keep pushing forward. That's that's really the key. You can't go, I'm no good at this. I have the idea, but I don't feel like doing it. Then you really don't want to do it at all. That's that's really the the thing. Just gotta sit down, do it, and keep going no matter what.

Matt 15:26

Yeah, I I don't know the percentages, but it sounds like what you're saying is that there's uh some small amount that is creativity and some larger amount that is effort.

Mike 15:37

Yes, effort effort, effort is key. That's that's the thing. Because, you know, after sitting sitting around writing all day, and I come home and I want to write my own stuff, I'm like, I do not feel like sitting down and doing this again, having to sit and think and write all day. But if you're like, I if I want to get this book out or I want to get this TV show uh developed, you have to do it. So, you know, sit down, take a few breaks, you know, and get it done though.

Mike’s Comic Book School Project

Matt 16:08

Yeah. Well, I want to talk to you a little bit about your your comic book, our comic book school project, because I I do think it's uh pretty cool. I know you and as I mentioned, buddy Scalera are doing that. Tell us a little bit with the concept and what what is it that you guys are are talking about on a weekly basis?

Mike 16:24

Uh well, the the you know, the log line of the show is the craft and business of making comics. So we sit down and we talk to writers and artists and um illustrators and and colorists and anyone who is involved in the whole comic field. Because we want people out there to, you know, if they have an idea, to start doing it. And that's again, as I was just saying, it's hard to get started. And this, I think, is is something that we talk about because you can see people, even who are, you know, famous in the industry, that they had to start somewhere. So it's not like, oh, they just had an idea and they sent it into Marvel in DC, and now they're the biggest thing ever. You had to keep working on it. So, yeah, that's what comic book school is all about. It's just getting the information from others out there, showing them how it's done, showing them what they can do, and you know, passing it on to the to audience.

The live stream video content process

Matt 17:23

So let's talk about video for a second in that in that context. And so you guys are doing a uh it's a weekly live stream, and then uh that goes to to YouTube, I believe. And then from there, you're doing like other cuts and edits. And what tell us a little bit about that process? What does it look like? Because it is interesting to take, and you know, as a kind of fellow podcast live stream, we've I've done uh what's that process look like going from that kind of that that core piece of media to kind of the other pieces that you're creating? What are what are you doing?

Mike 17:54

Yeah, the the live stream goes out uh directly on YouTube, um, and we leave that one up with all the mistakes and everything that that happened on a live show. Um and yeah, then then I take it into um Camtasia or one of the uh other editing programs, sometimes right off of YouTube, and you just have to cut it up, and this is also where it comes in with telling a story. You have to take the pieces that you can see that are gonna be good and and that it will hook people in, and you just gotta sit down and watch the whole thing and start cutting it up into pieces that you think the audience is gonna find interesting. Like we've been doing a lot lately with um sketching. We've had a couple artists on there, uh, Pat Quinn, Jay Martin, uh both both um comic writers and and uh artists, and just watching them draw, because they'll sketch right live on the show, and it's it's fantastic. So we cut them up into little tiny, tiny uh you know, vertical videos, and they've been doing really well for us. And it's fun, I think people love watching, especially something like that, come to life. It's a lot different when you're writing, but when you're sketching, you can actually see the the drawing expand and then they start inking and and getting it all ready. It's it's so much fun to to find the story in even a you know 30-second to a minute clip. It's interesting.

Matt 19:26

Yeah, yeah, I imagine. And and it creates that unique challenge of like how do you how do you pull that out? And it goes back to kind of what we were talking about, I think, at the beginning of like there you could show the whole process, right? There's ways to do that in in a shortened fashion, which is also interesting if you've ever watched like speed painting and stuff like that. But it's like, what don't you need to show or say or have because live experience is like this conversation, it's very different than like what would fit in a 30-second, 60-second kind of medium. So I do think that's that's super interesting.

Repurposing moments from bigger media

Matt 19:58

What for from your perspective, as you know, I'm thinking about other people who could use this kind of technique to help them, you know, make big take these bigger pieces, turn it into smaller pieces. Is there any advice you'd give to people to help them to find those 30-second stories or 60-second stories in bigger media? Because it is, I'll admit, it's it can be really challenging to take, you know, from something that already exists. It's one thing if you're creating it to be short. It's but when you've got, I'm assuming, 30 minutes, an hour, and you're saying, pull this little thing, what is it that helps you find the kind of thread, the pull that story together?

Mike 20:34

Uh, you just have to find, especially what I'm doing, I just find what's most engaging for me. Uh it's kind of like I I start with a question of what do I think is interesting after watching the whole thing? What do I what did I pull out of this? And then I take that and I I start, that's where I started. And you just have to make sure that as you're going through it, you know where to cut. So it's not a cliffhanger, but you know, enough to make people want to see what's coming next. You know, in comics, it's the same thing. When you when you end on a page, you want it to be a cliffhanger, so they want to flip the page over to see what's going to happen. So it is sometimes uh interesting to to go through these things and go, where where can I find a great cut in this that'll make someone go, oh, I'm gonna keep watching for the next you know five, 10 minutes. So it's it's uh it's it's fun to sit down and try and figure that all out.

Matt 21:31

Yeah. Uh I I gotta imagine also, you know, uh the challenge of just the time, especially if you have a longer piece, you gotta go through it, you gotta watch it, you gotta consider. And uh obviously hopeful hopefully some tools help make that a little bit easier, but there's still just the the work in there. So

Quick questions for Mike

Matt 21:48

well, Mike, this has been an awesome conversation. I do have a couple what I'm gonna call we I typically have done in the past speedrun. I've kind of gotten rid of the speed round questions, but I have a couple questions I want to ask that fit more in this quick, fast question. uh type category and i want to ask if you're if you're game uh so if you're game here we go number one you have been in a writer's room you know what that's like is there any writer's room if you could have been part of it that you would have jumped at the chance

Mike 22:13

uh supernatural if i could have been on that show in the writer's room that would have been absolutely fantastic so mike why would you want that show to be in that writer's room what about it uh it would be attractive that that genre that type of show that's kind of you know obviously supernatural kind of stuff with even if it is the monster of the week I love that stuff that gets me so excited and and the way they built that show with uh the two characters Sam and Dean loved it they were great to follow they were so much fun and you know it's one of those shows where you're like these guys feel like my my brothers I can hang out with them so yeah those that's that's one of the shows I definitely would have loved to have been on.

Matt 22:57

That's awesome. Okay so second question speedrun question number two if you had to pick a comic book hero to be who who are you gonna be not not which one do you love to read we might ask that too but like which comic would you which comic book hero would you want to be

Mike 23:14

uh probably Spider-Man I mean cuz he's he's the most fun he he doesn't seem that he's taken everything so seriously at least especially in the in the early issues of of when he first started um and you get to swing around the city you know who I can't say that I'd be really excited about wearing all the spandex but you know you only swing around the city just you know doing everything clinging to walls getting away running around fight fighting the heroes wrapping them up or fighting the the villains it'd be a lot of fun yeah absolutely I think Spider-Man's a great answer uh personally that's it's uh it you're right he is he's fun he's lovable he's he's got some cool stuff he gets to do the stakes aren't always I mean there are some sheer stakes but not always super high stakes right deals with like you know jewelry robbers and and bank robbers and things like that every now and then you get somebody like the rhino who just goes and wrecks things but you know generally he's dealing with low-level crime kind of guys

Matt 24:17

yeah um so third qu third and last speed round question for you is is there anything coming up that you're excited about to work on it doesn't have to be like a job or anything like that but just something you're working on that you're like just got you pumped right now

Mike 24:31

uh working on uh another novel uh with a friend of mine we're we're you know typing away doing what we can trying to get things uh pushed out as fast as possible but it's a it's a long process so we just keep plugging away yeah uh writing uh books is not for the faint of heart it is it's it's better to do it the way the way we do it with a partner because um the way we did it with the first one it's just I would write 500 words and send it to him and then he would write 500 words in return and send it back to me so you don't have to think a whole lot because at least the way we wrote the first one there was no planning there was no plotting there was no nothing it's just like sit down write some words send it off and then we see what happens from there. So we're we're gonna try that again and see if we can we can hit it uh like we did the first one

Matt 25:27

yeah awesome

Where to find Mike

Matt 25:29

well mike this has been just a fantastic opportunity to talk thank you so so much for for joining me in the visual lounge uh if people want to to learn more about your your novel they want to connect with comic book school or anything that you're doing how should they connect with you

Mike 25:45

uh well comicbookschool.com that's uh one way I have my own web page mikefasolo.com um I'm on Instagram is Mikefasolo1987 that was my favorite year by the way um uh twitter I think Twitter um fasolo but the O's are zeros um blue sky Mike Fasolo over there yeah and yeah I mean if uh if you everybody wants to pick up the book the first book is on Amazon it's called Sky Master Mike Fasolo uh my co-writer is Pat David you can look that up and uh be great yeah take a look at it it's kind of fun

Matt 26:26

that's awesome awesome we'll definitely check that out we'll put all the links down in the description stuff so people can easily find you um but

Mike’s final take

Matt 26:33

and Mike as we wrap up we like to end a show uh always in the same way and asking our guests uh what is your final take

Mike 26:41

uh my final take is if you have an idea if you have something that you want to do sit down and do it I mean it takes a lot of effort it takes a lot of stress but the thing is if it's you know kind of like one of those little brain worms and it keeps poking at you then it really needs to come out so don't just sit on it and say oh I'll do it later sit down take your time and get it down so everybody can share whatever it is that's floating around in your head

Matt 27:14

absolutely I I love that I love that advice. Well Mike thanks again for joining me in the Visual Lounge.

Mike 27:20

All right thanks for having me  

Matt 27:21 Mike 27:21 Mike 27:21

you bet.

Matt 27:22

All right everybody you heard it like what a great insight into writing creativity and making things happen inside of your organization. Now you might feel like oh this is a distant connection but there's there's the great thing there is there's that connection to the everyday work even though we might not get the chance to use superheroes in our stories or or monsters or anything like that or or we're not trying to make fun of every single pop culture reference there is but you can see how you can make these connections to the things that you do and how you can pull on creativity how you can pull on that work to create things that are going to be meaningful for your client connect with them and help them to discover or learn whatever it is you're trying to do. And as we talked about Mike a little bit already that some of it's right a lot of it's effort and what we hope you get we're gonna have to take a little bit of time every day to expand your effort to level up everything.