David Wise (writer)

At the age of sixteen, Wise abandoned film-making for writing, determined to become a professional science fiction writer. The following year Wise sold several SF short stories to various anthologies. This led directly to his first television writing job, an episode of Filmation's animated Star Trek series entitled "How Sharper Than a Serpent's Tooth," written in collaboration with Russell L. Bates. The series as a whole won the only Emmy any Star Trek series has won in a non-technical category, for best children's production.[5]

After a successful stint of live action work, writing for Glen A. Larson's Buck Rogers (the "Space Vampire" episode) and the Lynda Carter series Wonder Woman, Wise returned to animation in the 1980s, collaborating on many of the animated endeavours of that period such as He-Man and Mighty Orbots.

Wise also wrote Transformers episodes during the second and fourth seasons, including the Optimus Prime origin story "War Dawn", the comedy chase format of "Kremzeek", and the final three episodes of the original G1 series "The Rebirth", which Wise was forced to edit from five parts to three due to diminishing popularity of the franchise. During this period Wise also wrote scripts for Jem and My Little Pony.

In 1987, Wise was given the call to develop and write a five-part animated television pilot based on an independent comic, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Wise helped change the darker toned black and white Mirage title into a fun, bright, cheerful animated show. Wise left after the ninth season, writing and story editing over 100 episodes.

Wise next worked on Disney's Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers, and Mighty Ducks cartoons, and also wrote three episodes for Batman: The Animated Series, "The Clock King," "The Strange Secret of Bruce Wayne" (based on Steve Englehart's comic book story), and the origin story of The Riddler, "If You're So Smart, Why Aren't You Rich?".

He wrote the Battletoads animated pilot episode, as well as the two-part pilot for C.O.P.S., "The Case of C.O.P.S. File 1." He wrote some episodes of Defenders of The Earth. He wrote and story-edited such comic-based series as Cadillacs and Dinosaurs and Jim Lee's WildC.A.T.S. He also developed, story-edited, and wrote most of the 26 episodes of Disney TV's Mighty Ducks: The Animated Series. During this period he also wrote and produced the live-action film Beastmaster III: The Eye of Braxus, and was the first writer/story-editor on an animated interpretation of Zorro.

Wise's TV writing career ended with his work on Zorro in 1997. He was later founder, owner and CEO of the multi-media company Go! Media Entertainment from 2005 to 2010. Go! Media Entertainment consisted of the publishing imprint Go! Comi, and the digital entertainment division oPlay. Go! Comi was a moderately successful imprint (amongst the titles published were the Eisner-nominated After School Nightmare, adapted by Mallory Reaves and edited by Brynne Chandler), but oPlay's digital entertainment app was unsuccessful, leading to the company's bankruptcy.

He wrote the final episode of the fourth series of the Doctor Who-related Gallifrey audio drama series for UK-based Big Finish Productions. In 2019, David was announced as part of the team developing a television series based on the life of decorated dog hero Sergeant Stubby, serving as a prequel to the 2018 animated feature film Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero.[6] Two years earlier, he was announced to be writing a feature adaptation of the graphic novel Pet Robots for Animal Crackers producer Blue Dream Studios.[7] Both projects were written alongside his wife Audry Taylor and artist and animator Scott Christian Sava, and remain unproduced.

• Star Trek: The Animated Series (1974)
• The Secrets of Isis (1975)
• Space Sentinels (1977)
• The New Archie and Sabrina Hour (1977)
• Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle (1978)
• Web Woman (1978)
• Wonder Woman (1978)
• Godzilla (1979)
• Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1980)
• Space Stars (1981)
• The Biskitts (1983)
• The Smurfs (1983)
• He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983)
• Mighty Orbots (1984)
• The Transformers (1985–1987)
• Defenders of the Earth (1986)
• Kissyfur (1986)
• My Little Pony (1986)
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987–1996): seasons 4-5 and 8-9 head writer
• Dinosaucers (1987)
• Jem (1987)
• Spiral Zone (1987)
• Starcom: The U.S. Space Force (1987)
• COPS (1988)
• Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers (1989)
• James Bond Jr. (1991)
• Batman: The Animated Series (1992)
• Battletoads (1992)
• Cadillacs and Dinosaurs (1993)
• The New Adventures of Speed Racer (1993)
• Transformers: Generation 2 (1993)
• Conan and the Young Warriors (1994)
• Wild C.A.T.s (1994)
• Mighty Ducks: The Animated Series (1996)
• The New Adventures of Zorro (1997)

• Beastmaster III: The Eye of Braxus (1996)