Teen Titans Go! EP and Cast Celebrate 10th Anniversary with Week-Long Marathon, Tease Epic 400th Episode, and More

By Matthew Aguilar

Teen Titans Go! is celebrating its 10-year anniversary this week, and thankfully the show isn't slowing down in the least. Season 9 and the series' 400th episode is right around the corner, and to celebrate the series will kick off a weeklong marathon featuring every episode of the series on Sunday, April 23rd. Ahead of the marathon, ComicBook.com had the chance to sit down with Executive Producer Pete Michail, Raven star Tara Strong, and Robin star Scott Menville, where we talked about celebrating such a huge milestone, how the show stays so fresh and relevant, and what the future holds.

Celebrating 10 years is a major milestone in any medium, but especially in animation. With the marathon coming up, I wanted to know if they ever go back and watch old episodes to see how far the show has come, and that does happen to be the case.

"Creatively on the team, we definitely always go back a lot, either to farm certain animation or just honestly curious. Sometimes we're just curious to see how the show has grown visually, but yeah, it is a surprise that we are here 10 years later, especially for kids' animation," Michail said. "A lot of these shows last two, three seasons and they're out, so for us to be pushing nine and here 10 years later, still strong, it's an absolute blessing."

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(Photo: Warner Bros. Animation/Cartoon Network)

"It's all thanks to the fans, man. We work hard on our end, but it's the fans and our audience that keeps us strong and relevant and that we keep on finding," Michail said. "We've been on long enough that our old fans have grown, and we've found a whole new crowd, which is thanks to them for keeping us here."

"We hear that at Cons all the time. People say, 'Thank you for my childhood,' and they say, 'I used to watch this when I was a kid, and now I'm watching it with my kids from the OG Titans to this series.' I think because they kept the same voice cast, people really fell in love with us as a whole, and we all really love each other and then that translates," Strong said.

"I think Go is just so much fun. No one can argue. Go is probably the most fun show you can watch. It's not annoying. It's not afraid to make fun of itself. All the crazy educational episodes and the jokes. I mean, I don't know how y'all get away with half the stuff you write, Pete, but we have so much fun playing these characters and working together. I think we all authentically love each other so much, and I think that's another reason why it translates," Strong said.

"There's not much more I can add to that except I'm just so grateful to get to keep doing it. It's just so much fun. I just really feel like the writers continue to push the boundaries and expand what's possible to do on this show," Menville said. "The animators continue to surprise me in joyous ways like, 'Wow. Look what they did to my line reading on that or to Greg's line read.' I've got to give you props, Pete, a lot of times as voice actors, we'll get an idea for an ad-lib or a different take on a line and we're like, 'Hey, can I try this?' Pete's answer is 100% of the time, 'Yes.' That doesn't mean that line always works or makes it into the final, but trying something crazy and outside of the box is always welcomed, which is great, so it's so much fun to do."

Even four or five years for an animated project is impressive, so 9 seasons is truly rarified air. What's even more difficult to do in that kind of timespan is stay relevant without trying too hard, and Titans continues to excel in that regard, always feeling fresh and topical but never overreaching. As for how the show makes that happen, it's truly a team effort.

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(Photo: WarnerMedia)

"You know what? A lot of us on the show, and let me answer that question by just giving you just a little behind the scenes. One of the things that is beautiful on Titans and it's by design is that we don't put any of our departments in lanes," Michail said. "If you're a character designer, and you have a story idea, come and pitch it to the writers. You know what I mean? You're an animator, and you've got an idea for some design thing? To that, we have so many people on our crew that are constantly so in the game with us that everything stays fresh. Much respect to Warner Brothers in DC for allowing us to do this, but the show has transcended comic book superheroes. We can fight a big baddie in one episode and teach you about healthcare in another, and it's not weird."

"I mean, we had to earn our time there. We probably couldn't come out of the gate with that, and you'd probably be scratching your head, but yes, 10 years later we can air those episodes back to back and you're like, I'm on board," Michail said. "How we stay relevant, man? Again, we're all huge fans of pop culture, be it through music and songs and just whatever the dumbest trend is that's happening. If it is ridiculous to us, then we'll throw it in a show or subvert it somehow, but it's such a massive effort. I mean, even the actors. I'll get texts all the time like, 'Yo, we should do this episode about this. I just ran into this thing.' We'll get ideas even just from this phone call. Maybe they'll say something, I'll be like, 'Oh, that's funny,' and I'll jot it down."

There's a lot to be proud of with Titans, so it's understandable that it was near impossible to pick just one thing. "I'm so proud of all of it, man. I'm so proud of our team. A lot of them have been with us for the 10-year run, and that's kudos to just the love that they have for the show and more than proud, man. Echoing what Tara said, I feel incredibly blessed and lucky to even be here talking to you about this milestone of being on air for 10 years and going," Michail said.

As for what's to come, the team couldn't dish all the secrets, but they teased some big things happening in season 8. "What can I tease? Well, look, man. Season 8, we are hitting our 400th episode. I can't tell you what it's about, but we're doing something we've never done before, and it's something we've been wanting to do for years and years, and now we are finally doing it, so that's going to be big," Michail said.

"The 400th is going to be pretty sick," Menville said.

You can watch the 10th-anniversary marathon starting tomorrow on Cartoon Network, which will deliver every single episode of Teen Titans Go! throughout the entire week. You can also watch our full interview with Tara, Scott, and Pete in the video above.

What do you want to see next from Teen Titans Go? Let us know in the comments and as always you can talk all things DC and Titans with me on Twitter @MattAguilarCB!

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