Ted Koplar may have been the man behind the money and secured the funding and the station for Voltron: Defender of the Universe to make its industry-shattering debut.
Lesser known, however, is the Executive Producer, Peter Keefe, who poured his heart and soul into creating an iconic, time-transcending masterpiece that the kids of yesterday adored so much that they’re showing it off to their kids today.
Keefe lived an unusual life, and dedicated his work to creating positive children’s programming, and even after he and Koplar parted ways, he went on to found his own network, Zodiac Entertainment, with Brian Lacey, and continued to release children’s entertainment, including a wildly popular cartoon titled Widget about a purple alien who goes around helping people.
Peter Keefe was brilliant and ambitious in his drive to create positive children’s programming, and without the core of his work, Voltron: Legendary Defender, would never have existed.
Stay tuned for an upcoming meta on the life and livelihood of the man who made the magic happen. When asked what he hoped people took away from Voltron: Defender of the Universe, Peter Keefe had this to say:
“What I hope that anyone gets whoever looks at Voltron, even if it’s a thousand years from now on some technology that would amaze us, some holographic technology, is that it’s a microcosm of our world. There’s beauty, there’s grace, there’s dignity, but there’s evil. And the evil isn’t pedestrian evil. It’s real. It’s people who will do something evil because they can get away with it - not just because they’re a bad guy or a bad woman. They will see weakness - they will see weakness in the character’s souls, they’ll see remorse, they’ll see grief, they’ll see avarice, they’ll see anguish. Some of the deadly sins are in the show, not many one or two. They’ll see humanity in a make-believe realm but with real characters walking back and forth across the stage. So I think they’ll see a passion… and I hope they take a passion for life, for humor, and they understand that at the end of the day, it’s not who’s the most powerful, who’s the most brave, who’s the most strong… it’s more like… who has the biggest mind and how open can your mind be, and how important a sense of humor is and we shouldn’t all take ourselves too seriously. So if they walk away with a little bit of a lighter lilt to their step that’s what Voltron means.
It means have a heart. Have a soul. And of course it takes place in a wildly fanciful world… but that’s what people take. I hope.”
-Peter Keefe (Bonus Content, Defender of the Universe DVD collection. https://youtu.be/kJNYEGdBKbM?t=1038)
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