Are you ready to Save the Supers? Sandeep Parikh, probably best known for his role as Zaboo on The Guild, and the creation of the video game parody series The Legend of Neil, is taking on superheroes with his new web series for My Damn Channel. The first three episodes of the ongoing series are already online – you can check them out here – featuring ridiculous riffs on familiar characters. Imagine the Justice League, if they were flat broke, and you’ve got the gist.

“In 2004 I wrote a pilot called The Good Guys that none of the networks wanted,” said Parikh when we chatted on the phone earlier this week. “They were all interested, but thought superheroes were too high concept for television… And then Heroes came out, years later.” After that failed pitch session, Parikh moved on to Legend of Neil, before hooking up with My Damn Channel. He re-pitched the idea – superheroes, in a realistic world, strapped for cash – and the online network jumped at the idea. “I got to bring it back to life!” said Parikh with a laugh.

Before you start thinking that Parikh is the “niche” guy though, with his video game parody series, and his superhero parody series, the multi-hyphenate has long range plans for “Save the Supers.” “It’s more episodic in nature, than serial,” clarified Parikh. “It doesn’t really have an end in sight. I think we can watch these characters grow and change over the years… If I do it right, and hit the formula right, people will want to follow their stories.”

He added that because of the setting, he can “mess with whatever we want,” from time travel, to dinosaurs and beyond. That said, it doesn’t mean the form doesn’t hold its challenges, including taking the short time a web series provides to set up a brand new world in two episodes, before expanding to playing with the concept starting with the just released third episode. Including in that? The chance to get some guest stars, like Seth Green, Felicia Day, Fiona Gubelmann (Wilfred), Burnie Burns (Red vs. Blue), and others. “They’ll be able to play within the world we created,” said Parikh.

Parikh isn’t just the creator of “Save the Supers,” though: he’s also a customer. Er, actor, as he appears in the series as Merman, a thinly veiled parody of exactly who you think. “Originally, I wasn’t going to be in it,” said Parikh, though he changed his mind between the first time doing the series – in 2004 – and this current iteration. “I said, why the hell not? Can’t a mer-creature be Indian? I was excited to play not the wacky guy, but a central character, the guy who’s going to get picked on.”

As for the other cast members, Mickey Hawtrey – who plays the all powerful World Man – was the only holdover from the original version of StS. “He’s such the office fratboy,” said Parikh. “In order to pull that character off you have to be likeable, and Mickey can do that.” Max Bird-Ridnell, on the other hand, was, “the big surprise,” says Parikh. “He’s someone very different than I’m used to working with, in that he doesn’t improvise. It was a challenge for me on set, because I’m used to people who riff forever. He would finish his scene – and nail it. There’s a reason not every actor is an improviser.”

Following up on that, we were curious as to how the process of making the show works: is it improvised, scripted, or something else? “We live somewhere between a fully improvised and scripted show,” clarified Parikh. “We write full scripts, we plot them out, we shotlist them... But I allow for riffing in the set-ups. The way we shoot, in such a high schedule, to get such a high production value... We have to shoot it like we do a movie. We need to know our gags so we can have to build them all. In the end, it’s probably eighty percent scripted, twenty percent improvised.”

Now, not to spoil too much, but in the third episode, there’s a particularly great running bit where most of the Supers’ hide-out turns out to be made of cardboard. “We were actually having a lot of trouble with this episode!” said Parikh with a laugh. “I wanted to come up with a unique talent for Panthera that wasn’t just a Catwoman thing. We hit on this idea that when she steals things from museums, then she replaces them with replicas to buy some time.” So you get cardboard museum pieces, but also a cardboard car, and more. “We initially wanted to make a whole car out of cardboard,” continued Parikh, “but that was sadly not in our budget!”

So since Parikh has this whole world set up, we were wondering whether he’d want to see “real” superheroes in the mix. With a laugh, Parikh said, “Well, our superheroes are the actual ones. The other ones are fictional. Lets just say that versions of the Avengers will show up going forward. And this whole thing came out of my love for the SuperFriends when I was a kid. I would get my cape and watch the show with my older brothers. It comes more from the DC side, but we’re going to mish-mash all those universes together, because we don’t have rules where we have to keep them separate.”

Before you go thinking that Parikh has a pile of old comic books at home that he pours through to set up episodes... Well, not so much. He added that he came more from the TV/animated side of things, and only recently got into comics once starting the show. His girlfriend on the other hand, is a “crazy comic book reader,” and has been forcing Parikh to read books like The Boys, Invincible, and more just to “make sure you’re not stepping on their toes.” He also mentioned that he just finished Spider-Man: Blue, and Batman: The Long Halloween was up next, so his comic book education has begun.

Save The Supers is now on My Damn Channel, with new episodes premiering each week.