Rocko - Conception and Development

Conception and Development

Rocko first appeared in a never-released comic, where he has the name "Travis". Joe Murray, creator of Rocko's Modern Life, believed that the personality of a wallaby suited Rocko after observing a zoo wallaby "minding his own business" while elephants and monkeys "screamed for attention." After the event, Murray said that "t kind of clicked. Rocko would be at the center of the hurricane of everything swirling around him. He'd be like the everyman who's affected by the dramatic personalities around him."

Murray wanted to get his comic into syndication. Afterwards Murray made substantial changes to Rocko. Murray added that the personality of a wallaby mirrored Rocko's humbleness and his tendency to keep his frustrations to himself instead of publicly complaining about them.

In the original pilot for Rocko's Modern Life, the animators colored Rocko yellow. One month before the first episode was submitted to the animation studio in South Korea, Murray changed the color when a toy company wishing to make Rocko plushes refused to license the character after citing that Rocko looked too similar to a yellow character used in one of the company's existing products. Murray fought the changes with the Nickelodeon executives; in the end the executives insisted on changing the color, so Murray changed the color to beige and disliked the choice. On his website Murray said, "He was always yellow to me." Murray said that the company later backed out of the commitment and did not create the plush series.

Murray auditioned Alazraqui in San Francisco, and chose him as the voice actor for Rocko. Jeff "Swampy" Marsh, a storyboard writer, describes Alazraqui's voice for Rocko as "not really an accurate Australian accent" ; according to Marsh the team used the voice as Alazraqui used the voice for the pilot.

Murray said that as the series progressed, he adjusted Rocko's design from episode to episode to be more "volume friendly" and "animator friendly." According to Murray, when he created independent films and the Rocko's Modern Life pilot, he created all of the character layouts in his mind and other animators used the layouts to create works. Murray said that when Rocko became "high volume," Murray taught Americans and Koreans how to draw the characters. Murray described Rocko as the most difficult character to draw, and he said that therefore he decided to adjust his character design in order to assist the overseas animators. Murray said that as he and the directors continued to "quickdraw" the character changes to the design "naturally" lessened the "victim, paranoid" aspect and gave the character a "happy personality."

According to George Maestri, Rocko has no family name because the writers did not think of a family name that they desired. In a concept sketch Murray named the character "Rocko Rama". The writers considered the family name "Stretchbrain" because the character's brain popped out of his head during "odd moments." The writers scrapped the idea, leaving the character with one given name. Some websites, including Hot Topic, give him the family name "Wallabee" and the middle name "James". In "Dental Hyjinks," the first story of the Marvel Comics Rocko's Modern Life series Issue #1, the nurse addresses Rocko as "Mr. Rocko." In "Intestinal Turmoil," the first story of Issue #2, the doctor addresses Rocko as "Mr. Rocko" and Rocko answers the telephone with the words "Rocko residence."