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LOS ANGELES, Oct. 5 (UPI) -- Felicia Day said her original audio show, Third Eye, available Thursday on Audible, satirizes the sort of fantasy stories she loves. Day, 44, wrote Third Eye and plays Laurel, a psychic who once failed in her mission.
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"We've got romances, we've got fart jokes, we've got everything you need -- [even] a minotaur," Day told UPI in a recent Zoom interview. "I think a fart joke's the funniest thing."
Day said the humor of the seven-hour audio series would likely land a PG-13 rating were it a live-action movie. Day said the show is not raunchy.
"There's one F-bomb, I think, and it was very tastefully chosen because it's really funny," Day said. "There's a little innuendo but certainly it's very harmless."
Third Eye is set in a modern-day San Francisco in which magic and creatures are real. Laurel was supposedly destined to save the world, but failed 15 years ago.
"I took a lot of the tropes of our fantasy world and I wanted to turn them upside down," Day said. "What if a chosen one fails? What if a vampire doesn't have fangs? What if a fairy princess isn't a delicate thing?"
Many fantasy stories revolve around a hero destined to defeat the great evil. Frodo Baggins in Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, or Neo in The Matrix all qualify.
Even Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, on whose show Day appeared in the final season, dealt with Buffy's destiny to save the world. Day said it occurred to her that the chosen one leaves the rest of society out.
"I think saying that your genes tell you that you're chosen is kind of arrogant," Day said. "You're kind of just telling everybody else, 'You have no chance.'"
Day said the premise of Laurel was inspired by her own feelings of failure. Despite creating the web series The Guild, which ran for six seasons, and launching the successful streaming company Geek & Sundry, Day felt she didn't measure up.
"I never felt like I lived up to people's expectation of me," Day said. "That's completely self-imposed."
Exploring that feeling in a fantasy setting felt natural to Day, she said. Day said she also wanted to prove to people that fantasy and comedy could go together.
"I'm steeped in the tropes," Day said. "My natural inclination as a writer is to be like, 'Well, what have I not seen before? I want to do that.'"
The setting for Third Eye was inspired by Day's real life in Los Angeles. Day said she drove by so many Cash For Gold businesses, she imagined trolls and elves were secretly selling their gold regularly.
"I'm like, 'Where's all this gold coming from? Is there that much gold in Los Angeles? What are they doing with that gold?'" Day said.
Day's co-stars in Third Eye include sci-fi/fantasy veterans Sean Astin, Wil Wheaton, Danny Pudi, Harvey Guillén and Alan Tudyk. Gaming streamer LilyPichu and British standup comedian London Hughes also star and Weird Al Yankovic has a cameo.
Fantasy author Neil Gaiman narrates Third Eye. Day said she emailed Gaiman expecting him to politely decline.
"He got back to me and was like, 'I'm going to do this because I think it's good. Not because I'm doing you a favor but I think it's good,'" Day said. "I literally started weeping."
Day said the narrator is also a character, not just the storyteller.
"People think, 'Oh, he's narrating,'" Day said. "He's not. He is acting, y'all. He is that funny."
Day said she initially had the idea for Third Eye in 2015. She wrote a television pilot but could not sell it.
Day pitched it to Audible in 2018 and spent nearly five years writing and revising it. Third Eye recorded last year under voice director Jonah Ray, with whom Day works on Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Translating her idea into an audio show reminded Day why she got into the entertainment industry, she said. Day said she learned early in her career to find her niches in the "geek" and "nerd" worlds.
"I'm a square peg trying to fit in a round hole, even today," Day said. "The thing that I've learned is that my squareness is my super power."
Day has another smaller audio feature forthcoming and is writing stage plays and graphic novels. Day said outside of acting and hosting work, she seeks forums outside of traditional film and television for the projects she creates.
"I love Hollywood," Day said. "It's just my stories don't fit there a lot and that's okay."
All of Day's creations remain in the fantasy genre.
"I write what I know," Day said. "What I know is other worlds."
