plague of ghosts; "short on time and more than a little desperate, Janine turns to four of her teenaged students". Egon would be "huddled in front of a computer screen, battling program bugs instead of spooks". The show's creators decided "to put together a team of misfits in a way, people that you would not necessarily associate with being superheroes on television"; hence Eduardo as a slacker, Roland as a "square", and Kylie as moody and sarcastic, with Garrett as the balance, "an adrenaline junkie... who could kind of kick start the team". Fil Barlow, the designer, was given rough outlines and originally designed all the characters bar Eduardo as girls (Garrett as Lucy and Roland as Julia), with Egon originally designed as bearded and robed. This aspect would be dropped. Barlow pitched "Egon as an ambassador to the ghost realm trying to stop an impending war on the other side". During production, Lucy/Garrett was found to be quite bland and annoying until producer Jeff Kline suggested putting the character in a wheelchair; Higgins stated this made Garrett more interesting to write, as he was now "one of these guys that takes what he is given and makes the best of it and really lives up to any potential that he has". When designed as Lucy, she was given proton-blasting callipers and crutches, but producer Richard Raynis requested the wheelchair instead (Barlow attempted to show a female character could "be fearless and gung ho" but Raynis requested the gender change). The show ended up winning an award from the Los Angeles Commission on Disabilities for its work on Garrett. Various elements would be changed before airing: Egon would replace Janine as the teacher, Slimer lost a goblin sidekick called Gnat, and Garrett was originally "Lucas". Roland was originally a clumsy "gentle giant", Eduardo had a dream of running in the Olympics, and Lucas had a hair-trigger temper (some of these still made it to the character profiles on the EGB website). The team that helmed Extreme Ghostbusters consisted of many producers and writers that had done work on The Real Ghostbusters, including Raynis. As a result, the show was made as an explicit sequel to Real. This made the show one of the few direct sequels to a 1980s cartoon series — other franchises, such as Masters of the Universe and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, opted for series relaunches —