'Neon Joe, Werewolf Hunter' Season 2: Jon Glaser's zany comedy promises big, weird laughs

Culture

Fans of Parks and Recreation may recognize Jon Glaser as Leslie Knope's nemesis councilman Jamm. Those who watched Girls may known him as Lena Dunham's clingy neighbor Laird. But fans of edgy, inventive comedy will most likely know him as the creator and star of Adult Swim comedies Delocated and Neon Joe, Werewolf Hunter

For those who haven't seen Neon Joe, which premiered its first season in 2015, it's exactly how it sounds: Glaser stars as a guy who wears neon and hunts werewolves. Glaser came up with the concept by accident — it was part of a throwaway joke during an appearance on The Tonight Show — but the show has since amassed its own small and dedicated legion of fans, complete with their own inside jokes, catchphrases and memorabilia.

We recently chatted with the hilarious Glaser about Neon Joe's loony second season, which premieres Monday. 

Mic: Hi, this is Evan with Mic. How's it going? 

Jon Glaser: That's a pretty funny intro. Like, "Hi, this is Evan with Mike." Like you're with a guy named Mike.

Oh, yeah, I never do an interview without him.

JG: That's what I heard about you guys. That's why I wanted to do this interview.

So, congrats on getting a second season of Neon Joe, Werewolf Hunter. I understand it runs as a five-day miniseries. Why that format?

JG: That was ultimately the network's call, but I also like it. It seems good as a miniseries to me. There's something about it that felt like the right amount last time. If we do another season, maybe it will be more.

What would you say about season two to anyone coming in fresh?

JG: One of the things I'm most excited about is that season two feels very different from season one. You don't have to watch season one to get season two, but it helps. There are some returning characters, but most of the cast is new.

Sheila Breen Kenny/Adult Swim

There's a comic book accompanying this season. That's pretty cool.

JG: This one pretty much begins with the events of the first episode. The comic book for season one included some scenes from the original pilot that didn't make it into the show. They both look incredible. DC Comics puts them out — they're pretty legit. It was very cool to get them made. They made me look tough. They gave me muscles.

That's awesome. Did you collaborate on the design of the comic book?

JG: I was very involved as far as choosing which artists I liked the best. I got to give feedback as far as script notes and illustration notes. It was very collaborative. 

Tell me a little bit about your writing process.

JG: I have two regular writers, John Lee and Vernon Chatman. They work on all the shows I work on. It's all the same production company, it's called PFFR. This year we also had some outside writers to help work on the scripts for the sake of time. But with all that, you can still watch the show and go, "This is ridiculous." It's mostly just highly stupid. We're creating this massively dumb soap opera. There were even times in this season, and even last season, when I'm in editing and asking, "What are we doing? Are we making a comedy?"

You've mentioned in the past that a lot of Neon Joe's comedy is rooted in drama.

JG: For me, a lot of the stuff I like to do is certainly grounded in drama. And in this case, it's grounded in this melodrama of this horror genre, but everything is played very seriously. It's not played for bad special effects, it's not supposed to be hokey. It's supposed to be like a horror series and have all the comedy come from the drama. Sometimes there's jokes, sometimes there's stupid scenarios and a lot of times it's just dumb. But hopefully it's enjoyable.

Catch new episodes of Neon Joe, Werewolf Hunter on Adult Swim at 12:00 a.m. Eastern from Monday, May 22 to Friday, May 26. 

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