Adventure Time: Side Quests: Cash & Courtright on S02, LOTR & More

Posted in: Disney+, Hulu, TV | Tagged: adventure time, Adventure Time: Side Quests

Adventure Time: Side Quests: Cash & Courtright on S02, LOTR & More

Adventure Time: Side Quests Showrunner Nate Cash and supervising director Victor Courtright discuss Season 2, Sasha Knight, and much more.

Published Wed, 30 Sep 2026 20:37:09 -0500
by Tom Chang
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Article Summary

• Adventure Time: Side Quests bosses Nate Cash and Victor Courtright reveal how Season 2 grew from one 40-episode plan.
• Cash and Courtright discuss Sasha Knight as Finn, and how his chemistry with John DiMaggio helped the duo click fast.
• Adventure Time: Side Quests stays true to original continuity while giving Finn and Jake room for fresh prequel fun.
• The team breaks down LOTR and Wicker Man-style references, plus how far Adventure Time could push Standards and Practices.

When it comes to handling a prestigious animated IP as big as Pendleton Ward's Adventure Time, it can potentially be intimidating, but showrunner Nate Cash and supervising director Victor Courtright are having a devilishly fun time with the new Disney+/Hulu plus prequel series that brings the bulk of the original cast, featuring the voices of John DiMaggio (Jake the Dog), Hynden Walch (Princess Bubblegum), Tom Kenny (Ice King), Olivia Olson (Marceline), and Niki Yang as BMO. New to the prequel is Sasha Knight, who takes over the role of Finn the Human from Jeremy Shada, who voiced the character in the original series. Like its predecessor, Side Quests follows Finn and Jake as they complete odd jobs, interact with cloud people, explore the Land of Ooo, and engage in playful confrontations with classic villains like the Ice King. In part one of our interview, Cash and Courtright spoke to Bleeding Cool about how they planned the second season as part of the 40-episode batch that was ordered for Disney+ & Hulu, the chemistry between DiMaggio and Knight, returning favorites from the cast and creatives, and if there were any boundaries creatively they couldn't cross.

Adventure Time: Side Quests Showrunner and Supervising Director on Season 2 Planning, Lord of the Rings and The Wicker Man References & More

Bleeding Cool: With the second season of 'Adventure Time: Side Quests,' what did you want to accomplish from the previous season?

Cash: We kept on going. We actually got an episode order of 40, so we were doing season two as if it was the same. Yeah, we actually didn't know this was going to be season two.

Courtright: It was a surprise. Some of the episodes in our "season 2" are actually ones that we did in the first batch of 20, so we re-ordered things to our liking so that it was a really fun flow of episodes as well. All part of it of the same 40.

Cash: We hit the ground running as if we didn't know that was a different race.

Obviously, since you guys got in the can already, what did you like about just having to work with John [DiMaggio] and Sasha [Knight] and working their chemistry together as Jake and Finn?

Cash: It was awesome. We were so lucky to have found Sasha Knight to voice Finn because he brings so much innocence and care. He's just so perfectly similar to Jeremy Shada's Finn from seasons one and two [of the mothership series], but also so different. It's more a similar vibe, but he brings his own nuance to it, and really early on, John was very eager to hear who the new Finn is, so he gave his blessing and approval and loved the sound of Sasha's voice from the very get-go.

Courtright: We did a bunch of separate, isolated recording sessions, but then we finally got them into the same booth together for a few records. Once they were there together, it was just like watching the story come to life right in front of you; it was so fun, and their chemistry was solid.

The transition is seamless once you see many of the holdovers from the original 'Adventure Time' also return. Can you speak about working with them?

Cash: Bringing people back was awesome. I'm lucky to get [writer] Jesse Moynihan back for more. I think he was a little bit not sure how it would go. From his first episode, he was like, "Oh yeah! There are so many more stories to tell, and this is like riding a bike." It feels so natural, so quickly. Yeah, it was awesome, Niki (Yang) and everyone.

Courtright: It was really cool for those of us who weren't on the original show as well, like myself, getting to watch some of this stuff happen in the room with these legends.

With establishing 'Side Quests' as a prequel, were there any boundaries, or did it feel like something you could just start fresh from the get-go?

Cash: Yeah, definitely the idea was to not disrupt any continuity that was laid down in the original series, but also keep it self-contained where we weren't feeling too constricted by, like, "We can't do that because that came later." We ended up having fun with the world and the exploration of it without trying to tiptoe towards or away from any continuity, so it actually ended up feeling more natural than I thought it would before we started.

From what I've seen, it's amazing how you guys kind of squeeze in stuff like 'The Lord of the Rings' in 11 minutes; it's probably the shortest I've ever seen it condensed, and that 'The Wicker Man' reference. Was there an instance where you had to re-edit something for next season with the way content was handled, or could you have done anything you wanted?

Courtright: Legally, I don't know what you're talking about [both laugh]. I don't know what these things are you keep saying… as far as those references, it's what feels natural in the moment. You're telling a story that's like walking on the perimeter of something that's like familiar to people and to us that we're fans of or whatever. It naturally slips into that territory in a fun, silly kind of not-too-serious way. When it feels natural like that, it happens, and we hope that it can stick around.

Cash: I think the key is to not pull any punches. We weren't sure if we could get away with ending an episode with them "Wicker Manning," those Queen Kings, but it was so funny, and everyone laughed so hard that when it got to the point of (Standards and Practices) approving it, they're like, "Well, we can't actually show it. We're like, "Okay, we didn't watch it."

Season 2 of Warner Bros. Adventure Time: Side Quests is available on Disney+ and Hulu on October 2nd.

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