By Dr. Craig D. Reid
The dynamic epic manga comic Dreamhoppers, the debut brainchild of Laizen Comics, features actor/philanthropist Shin Koyamada, star of the Disney Channel’s top rated original movie Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior, as warrior leader Ren Matsuo who leads a team of five Dreamhoppers into the Dreamworld as to stop an evil entity from entering the real world and wreaking havoc upon mankind.
An avid collector of American and Japanese comics, Koyamada’s fascination and love for manga has finally culminated with a dream project…his own comic book series.
In 2008, Koyamada teamed up with graphic comic artist Travis Moore (who later worked DC Comics projects Superman, Wonder woman and Freedom Fighter) to begin fleshing out the story and characters for Dreamhoppers.
“The theme of Dreamhoppers,” Koyamada shares, “is to explore the parallel realities and the dream world when we go to sleep. By doing so this can free people from the fear that comes in the shape of nightmares.”
But there was still a missing link. In steps their final teammate Nia Lyte, who has not only explored and studied what happens to the brain and subconscious mind when we go to sleep but she has also been keeping records and painting her dreams for many years.
“The dream world is very interesting and deep, “ Lyte explains. “Travis, Shin and I met in our dreams as we were creating Dreamhoppers. In this project we used some of our real dreams and found commonality in our dreams and nightmares.”
Evolving from their harmonious fascination with the synchronicity between the dream world, real world and the Universe, Dreamhoppers is an action adventure about the supernatural powers given to certain people known as Dreamhoppers. These guardians of the Dreamworld can transform their human forms into fantasy characters and enter dreams in order to save one from the evils in the Dreamworld.
It is currently in the development and pitching stage of Live-Action film and TV anime series versions of The Dreamhoppers, produced by Shin Koyamada and Nia Lyte.