Eyepatch Wolves Brings a (Fake) Anime to Life as a (Real) Merch Line

Cult-favorite anime Eyepatch Wolves has launched a new merch line, allowing fans to snag the first official shirts, posters, and other products bearing the likenesses of Wolf, Crow, and the rest of the Angel City gang. You can check it out here.

…Wait, what? You don’t know what we’re talking about? Well, that’s because Eyepatch Wolves is a wild new idea from John Walsh, an artist and documentarian best known by his YouTube handle Super Eyepatch Wolf. Walsh, who has over 1 million subscribers on the video platform, developed a merch line (and the world surrounding it) based on one bottom line idea: he wants to contribute some of his own art to the conversation, rather than just discussing the work of others.

The project is based on an idea Walsh had years ago, which he had left behind before becoming a beloved figure on the internet. But he says that this isn’t just merchandise: eagle-eyed fans will be able to pick up on details in the merch that tell the story of the world of Angel City. In fact, this merch is just the first wave…based on the first arc in the story that will be happening in the background.

“When I was younger, I had this big fictional story that I would work on,” Walsh told ComicBook.com. “I’d sit down. I’d draw characters. We’re talking very early twenties. I’d sit down for an hour and I just draw a character sheets and stuff. It was this completely formless thing. It was just me putting more shit into a fictional world. At a point, it was a comic book. At a point, it was a game. At a point, it was all this stuff. Eventually, I got older. I got a job and I stopped working on it. Throughout the years, I always just thought of that as like, ‘Fuck, that was some of the most creatively happy I’ve ever been.’ No viewers, no audience, I didn’t even put these drawings on the internet. I guess part of it was just I wanted to recapture that. Then when I did the Space Jam video, I guess I felt that spark again. I think as humans, if something makes you feel like that, you’re a fool for not pursuing it, you know?”

What’s the Space Jam video? You can check it out below, but the short version is, Walsh made a video last year called Space Jam 2 is a Lie, and it is a long form video that examines the disappointment of Space Jam: A New Legacy through the lens of a fake Space Jam sequel which, honestly, absolutely should have been made, because Walsh’s version is brilliant and terrifying.

“The Space Jam video, that is the most fun I’ve ever had making a video,” Walsh said. “I was out of my mind delighted making that video, and I have other projects planned that are going to be very similar to the Space Jam video. But one of the things about the Space Jam video, it relies on the mythos of Michael Jordan, and Bugs Bunny, and all that kind of stuff. I really wanted to be like, ‘What can I do from scratch? Would this work?’”

And thus, back to Angel City. Well, back for Walsh. For the rest of us, it’s our first visit.

“I want people to be able to make connections in this world,” Walsh said. “Even what’s in there already, you’ll get a very subtle sense of what’s happening, if you just want to pay attention. If you just want to see them as cool designs, you can see them as cool designs.”

He added, “The whole idea of it is each new run of merch is going to be a new arc. So this first arc, to me, it’s very much like episodes one to four of Cowboy Bebop or whatever episodes come before Ballad of Fallen Angels, where you’re just hanging out with the characters and getting to know them. There’s obviously stuff going on in the backgrounds, but the focus, I really wanted to be them, their life, and specifically the connection they have to each other.”

And, no. The plan — at least for Walsh, and at least right now — is not to get it optioned and make it real. There’s no master plan to transform Eyepatch Wolves into a manga or an anime or anything else beyond what it currently is. The concept is weird and meta, but that’s part of what makes it exciting for Walsh as a creator.

“I know that sounds weird, but it’s like all I’ve wanted to do is make this story work as a merch line,” Walsh said, adding that he would be open to something else down the line, but only in the right circumstances. “I come from the animation industry. I understand how difficult animation is. I’ve read enough books about game development to understand that that’s animation squared. There is a beautiful simplicity to the way I get to do this, because I get to scout my favorite artists on the internet. I get to approach them about making some really cool stuff, and I get to write everything, and I get to control all myself. The moment it balloons up into something bigger, I’d give up that control. That could potentially be really cool, but as it is, I’ve loved making this so much.”

The next step is likely where it gets more complicated. There are some obvious teases (who is coming?!), and some likely less obvious ones, in the current line of merch. But once you get into a second arc, and you have people trying to piece together a year or so of stories based on a t-shirt…well, making that coherent is a fun mental exercise.

“Right now, the challenge is introducing the world and characters in a way that’s meaningful,” Walsh said. “If you go on, there’s no descriptive text of anything that’s actually happening. There’s pieces of dialogue, but there’s no description for what the world is, who the characters are, anything. So the problem was actually conveying that through the pieces themselves. From here, the problem is going to be advancing that story. I have some pretty specific things I want to do, and some pretty specific ideas on how to do it. It is definitely going to be a challenge, because I’m absolutely sure that someone else has done something like this at some point, but it’s not like there’s a lot of rules for this stuff either. This isn’t making a film or a painting. It’s something a bit different. I foresee it being a challenge, but I’m also really excited for the people who pay attention to see where this goes because I have some stuff planned.”