{"id":62942,"date":"2022-06-10T09:23:46","date_gmt":"2022-06-10T13:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.themainemag.com\/?p=62942"},"modified":"2022-06-10T09:23:48","modified_gmt":"2022-06-10T13:23:48","slug":"the-animator-documenting-maines-changing-landscape","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themainemag.com\/the-animator-documenting-maines-changing-landscape\/","title":{"rendered":"The Animator Documenting Maine\u2019s Changing Landscape"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Animator Hanji Chang with a Temp Tales illustration,
imitating a now-infamous Elizabeth Holmes magazine cover.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The first time Hanji Chang\u2019s animation work went viral, she was a student in the new media program at Maine College of Art in 2012. In the video, titled \u201cMeat Recall,\u201d Chang animated her husband Andy O\u2019Brien\u2019s comic about working in a Hannaford call center. The under-two minute clip features a chaotic, enthusiastic, and foul-mouthed exchange between a call center employee and an East Millinocket resident with a thick Maine accent, both voiced by O\u2019Brien. The video struck a chord with Maine audiences unaccustomed to seeing something so authentic to their state depicted in a cartoon. From the character\u2019s New England Patriots beanie and flannel shirt to the fridge full of Geary beer and Twisted Tea, Chang and O\u2019Brien captured a working-class Mainer stereotype that felt reverential and real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus began the popular, decidedly not-safe-for-work Temp Tale<\/em>s web series animated by Chang and written by O\u2019Brien. Created under the stitched-together name O\u2019Chang Comics, the series follows 30-something Atom O\u2019Chang (voiced by O\u2019Brien) as he works a series of odd jobs along Maine\u2019s coast. With the tagline \u201cby Mainers, for Mainers,\u201d Temp Tales<\/em> was inspired by the couple\u2019s experiences working various short-term jobs after the Great Recession and introduces viewers to a cast of characters loosely based off real Mainers that the couple met along the way. \u201cWe always have this undertone of a class struggle and the idea of big corporations and rich people versus working people [in Temp Tales<\/em>], because that\u2019s the background that we came from,\u201d says Chang, who has done everything from painting houses to yard work alongside O\u2019Brien, who now works for the Maine AFL-CIO labor union federation. \u201cLabor and class are something that we are passionate about.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Temp Tales characters Atom O’Chang (left) and Green
\u201cBud\u201d Kelly (right).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Chang and O\u2019Brien met in Taiwan and moved to his home state of Maine in 2007. The couple settled into life in Portland, where Chang says she was met with interactions that made her feel like she didn\u2019t belong, including people mispronouncing her name and incorrectly saying she was from China or Thailand. She started to turn these anecdotes into comics. In one, she and O\u2019Brien are referred to as John and Yoko in a series of scenes around Portland. In another, when she gets pulled over for driving erratically, it\u2019s chocked up to \u201ccultural differences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chang is used to being viewed as an outsider. Born and raised in Taiwan to a Korean mother and Taiwanese father, as a child her Korean lineage often set her apart from her peers. Her name, Hanji, is actually a nickname meaning \u201cKorean chick\u201d in Chinese, which she finds is easier for people in America to pronounce than her real name, Chen Hua. When she was four years old, her family moved to South Africa during the end of apartheid, and she was the only child of Asian descent at her elementary school. Once they returned to Taiwan five years later, she had to be held back in school because she needed to relearn Chinese. \u201cI feel like my entire life I\u2019ve just been trying to fit in and adapt,\u201d says Chang.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Chang at work in her home offiice.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

When Chang and O\u2019Brien used to attend comic conventions and meet-and-greets around the state for Temp Tales<\/em>, some fans seemed to be let down when they discovered who was behind the screen, Chang says. \u201cI feel like they\u2019re kind of disappointed when they meet us because they were probably expecting big, hairy dudes, and then they see me, an Asian woman, drawing them.\u201d Despite those negative interactions, her work on Temp Tales<\/em> has made her feel more accepted and a greater sense of belonging in the state. \u201cI feel like I\u2019ve done something for Maine, and I want to be considered a Mainer,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\t\t

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