The Gamesmaster: My Life in the '80s Geek Culture Trenches with G.I. Joe, Dungeons & Dragons, and The Transformers

by Flint Dille Narrated by Eric Michael Summerer

Overview

The Gamesmaster is a narrative memoir chronicling the life and career of Flint Dille. And while he isn't exactly a household name, you almost certainly know his work-which includes credits from some of the most important and successful entertainment franchises throughout the world across the cartoon, film, video game, and comic book industries and beyond.



Dille started his career writing and producing Saturday morning television shows, including Transformers and G.I. Joe, while also writing interactive novels with Gary Gygax, the creator of Dungeons & Dragons. From there, he'd go on to work with the likes of Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Frank Miller, Jack Kirby, and a raft of others as a writer, story editor, show runner, and/or producer of iconic entertainment in almost every medium.



Dille's memoir is an entertaining blend of pop culture, social history, and reportage about the exciting, groundbreaking 1980s, and the parts he and his colleagues, collaborators, employers, and friends played in making it a genuine Golden Age.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

"The Gamesmaster is a fond and honest firsthand assessment of a defining time in pop culture."
—Foreword Reviews

"The Gamesmaster is a delightful dungeon walk through Hollywood in the 1980s with a focus on how arcade games, Hasbro toys, Dungeons & Dragons, and Saturday morning cartoons commingled to bring on Geek Culture."
—Booklist

"Flint is a born yarn-spinner. Spending the 80's with him was to watch a man make an adventure of the era."
—Frank Miller, Eisner award winning-author of Sin City, 300, and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns

"Reading The Gamesmaster, I laughed, cried, and remembered. What a crazy amazing time it was. I'm certain none of us have ever experienced anything quite like it since. And Flint Dille was the big shaggy beast at the center of it all."
—Linda Woolverton, screenwriter of Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, and Mulan

"As all great epics do, this one begins humbly, with an unlikely collection of squires and apprentices gathering their dice, raising their plastic lightsabers and shouldering their Macintosh 128Ks to answer adventure’s call. In a time yet to come, these young men and women will play significant roles in defining the popular culture of that era. But now draw close and hark ye well, for this is how it all began."
—Paul Dini, Emmy award-winning writer of Batman: The Animated Series

"I met Flint in 1983 at the mansion that served as the headquarters for nascent Dungeons & Dragons Entertainment Corp. I lived at the mansion with my Dad and brother. Dad was gone a lot traveling, so oftentimes I’d wander out to see what Flint was up to in the studio. For anyone that knows him, it’s no surprise that I managed to convince him to play games, swim and generally hang out. Flint is able to tap into the fantastic and create vivid stories that influenced generations because he remains a kid at heart no matter that he is 6’5” and bearded."
—Luke Gygax, son of Dungeons & Dragons creator Gary Gygax

“I sometimes liken Flint to an imaginative cyclone ripping joyfully through the kaleidoscopic trailer park of pop culture. His creative impact on many of our most beloved fictional franchises still echoes across the decades.”
—Chris Metzen, creator of World of Warcraft

Kirkus Reviews

2020-05-27
A veteran of 1980s animation recounts his days working on G.I. Joe, Transformers, and a host of other cartoon shows based on popular toy lines of the era.

Back when the Star Wars franchise was fresh and Saturday morning cartoons were relevant, Dille got a call from Lucasfilm to try out as a writer for a new children’s show they were developing. For the author, whose grandfather was John F. Dille, publisher of the original Buck Rogers, the opportunity to work on a George Lucas property was exhilarating. Though it didn’t work out, Dille went on to work for Ruby-Spears and Sunbow Productions. Neither of those companies were at the level of Lucasfilm, but both proved to be crucial in his career development, which involved “an all-access pass to the geek eighties and working with an amazing collection of people who laid the foundations for what would be popular culture decades later.” The nascent writer was making a living adding literary depth to the Transformers’ weekly adventures as well as chronicling the mythical exploits of a barbarian named Sagard alongside Dungeons & Dragons co-creator Gary Gygax. Although Dille led a fairly fast-paced Hollywood lifestyle, his narrative approach to those halcyon days is oddly dispassionate and disconnected. He foggily confesses to forgetting key elements of his story, and the attention he gives major industry figures, including Jack Kirby, Steve Gerber, and Frank Miller, is scant at best. The author also gives short shrift to such seminal events as the dissolution of Gygax’s piece of the D&D empire. Dille’s reaction to being fired from the Garbage Pail Kids and immediately hired on Steven Spielberg’s Tiny Toons matches the overall tone of his memoir: “Who knows? Who cares? It didn’t, and doesn’t, matter.”

A middling memoir studded with a few interesting insights into 1980s Hollywood.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940177902432
Publisher:	HighBridge Company
Publication date:	06/09/2020
Edition description:	Unabridged

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