Jerry O’Flaherty, full name Jeremiah O’Flaherty, was born in Irving, a suburb of Dallas, Texas.  He is the fourth of ten children.  His father emigrated to the United States from Listowel, County Kerry, Ireland.  Therefore, O’Flaherty holds dual American/Irish citizenship.  He now lives in Santa Monica, California.  In his spare time O’Flaherty loves to paint.

His artistic talents have led to him being best known as Art Director on Gears of War from Epic Games.  He started his career in the game industry at sixteen years old.  By the age of twenty-four he partly owned video game developer KoP Media and sold it to Seventh Level two years later.  He was one of the original founders and owners of game company Ion Storm.  In 2003, O’Flaherty was given the role of Studio Art Director of Epic Games, dealing with the direction of Gears of War and Unreal Tournament 3.  He worked on the Command and Conquer series whilst employed by the innovative but now defunct Westwood Studios in Las Vegas, later absorbed into EA Los Angeles.

As well directing video games, O’Flaherty studied film at the University of North Texas near Dallas so he is more than well equipped to direct Thundercats The Movie.  I also think that if the high standard of Gears of War is anything to go by O’Flaherty will do us proud with this movie!    

Warner Bros have just announced that video game veteran Jerry O’Flaherty is set to direct the new Thundercats movie.

This will be O’Flaherty’s movie directing debut, he has previously worked as Art Director on video games Gears of War, Unreal Tournament 3 and Command and Conquer amongst other things.  He’d been looking to get into the film business for a while and thought about various projects before settling on Thundercats.

“It feels like a natural thing for me to step into” he said.  “Games have come so far now.  The last four years of my life have been about bringing the energy of filmmaking into the video game experience.”

O’Flaherty will work on the script with screenwriter Paul Sopocy.

O’Flaherty has said that the new Thundercats movie will stay true to the original cartoon series and will tell the story of the group of humanoid cats who flee their home planet of Thundera before it is destroyed.  The action will center on Lion-O who comes of age as the leader of the group as they battle with the evil sorcerer Mumm-Ra.

The word on the street is that Warner are to start producing Thundercats The Movie in February/March next year!  I am so happy to hear this news.  Thundercats, ho!!! 

The voices for the new CGI Thundercats movie are still to be confirmed but I’m hoping that they will stick to the original voices as far as is possible.  Sadly a couple of the original voice actors have now passed away, RIP Bob McFadden and Earl Hammond, you will never be forgotten.  Bob McFadden was outstanding as the voice of Snarf and Slythe and Earl Hammond played Mumm-Ra, Tug-mug and Amok magnificently.

I recently contacted Larry Kenney, the original voice of Lion-O and Jackalman, and he confirmed to me that he was keen to take on these roles again for Thundercats The Movie due to be released in 2010, however, he had not heard from Warner Brothers at that time.

I would love Lynne Lipton to be the voice of Cheetara again, she has such a sexy voice and this character just wouldn’t be the same without her.  She also played the voices of Wilykit, Luna and Queen Luna.

The other main Thundercats voice actors were Earle Hyman, Peter Newman, Doug Preis, Rob Paulsen, Victor Trujillo and Gerrianne Raphael.

Let’s hope Warner gives them all a call and keeps it real!