Early life
Reaves grew up in California and discovered science fiction and fantasy early. In 1972 he attended the Clarion Science Fiction Writers' Workshop in Michigan, a competitive residential program that launched many professional genre authors. He spent the early 1970s writing short fiction for science fiction and fantasy magazines before relocating to Los Angeles, where he supported himself with bookstore and retail work while breaking into professional writing.
His first professional screen credit came in 1975 with an episode of The Secrets of Isis, a live-action children's adventure series.1 He followed that with a pair of adult novels and continued building his fiction and television credits through the late 1970s. His early fantasy novel work includes The Shattered World (1984) and its sequel The Sword of the Samurai (with Steve Perry, 1984), as well as The Trine series.
Career
Animation, 1980s
Reaves became a go-to animation writer during the golden age of 1980s syndicated cartoons. He contributed scripts and story editing to a remarkable range of series, including He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, The Smurfs, Dungeons and Dragons, Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, Star Wars: Droids, Star Wars: Ewoks, The Transformers, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He served as head writer on both Pole Position and Mighty Orbots during this period.
Many of those credits came through a close working relationship with writer Steve Perry. Perry and Reaves collaborated on scripts, novels, and later Star Wars tie-in fiction throughout their careers.
Batman: The Animated Series and Gargoyles, 1990s
Reaves joined Batman: The Animated Series as a story editor and writer when it launched in 1992, working under showrunner Bruce Timm and producer Eric Radomski.1 His co-writing credit on "Heart of Ice" (alongside Paul Dini, Martin Pasko, and Sean Catherine Derek) earned him and the writing staff a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing in an Animated Program in 1993: one of the most prestigious recognitions in American television animation.3 Reaves also co-wrote the script for the theatrical film Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993), which expanded the animated continuity to cinemas.1
He carried that momentum into Gargoyles (1994), the ambitious Disney adventure series created by Greg Weisman. Reaves co-wrote the story for the five-part pilot episode that launched the series and wrote or co-wrote several additional episodes across the first two seasons, often alongside his then-wife Brynne Chandler (also credited as Brynne Stephens).4 Gargoyles drew a dedicated adult-as-well-as-children audience, and Reaves's work on the pilot helped set the show's unusually sophisticated tone.
He also served as head writer on Conan and the Young Warriors (1994) and Spider-Man Unlimited (1999).
Live-action television
Reaves's television credits were not limited to animation. He wrote for Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Twilight Zone (the 1980s revival), Swamp Thing, Shazam!, and the fan production Star Trek: New Voyages.
Star Wars novels, 2000s
Beginning in 2001, Reaves applied his long familiarity with the Star Wars universe to a sustained run of prose novels for the expanded universe. His debut Star Wars novel, Darth Maul: Shadow Hunter (2001), became a New York Times bestseller.1 He went on to write or co-write eight Star Wars novels over the following decade, including the MedStar duology (with Steve Perry), the Coruscant Nights trilogy (with Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff), and Death Star (with Steve Perry, 2007).
InterWorld and later work
After his Parkinson's disease diagnosis began significantly limiting his ability to type and speak, Reaves collaborated closely with his daughter Mallory Reaves and with author Neil Gaiman on the InterWorld trilogy. The first InterWorld novel (co-written with Gaiman) had originally been written as a television pilot in the 1990s before being published as a novel in 2007; Mallory co-wrote the subsequent sequels The Silver Dream (2013) and Eternity's Wheel (2015). He maintained a blog titled Parkinson's Monster, with Mallory's help, documenting his experiences with the disease.4
Ghostbusters
The Real Ghostbusters
Reaves was a regular writer for The Real Ghostbusters from the mid-1980s through 1990, contributing sixteen episodes either solo or in collaboration with Steve Perry. His episodes range from some of the series' most fondly remembered installments to more light-hearted outings. Several feature the Boogieman, a recurring villain Reaves helped introduce to the animated continuity.
Episodes written by Reaves (sole credit unless noted):
IDW Comics cameo
In Ghostbusters: Get Real Issue 1 (IDW Publishing), Reaves receives a small tribute: on page nine, panel five, his name appears as "M. Reaves" on a folder held by Janine Melnitz.5
Personal life
Reaves was married to writer Brynne Chandler (also known professionally as Brynne Stephens), with whom he co-wrote numerous animation scripts. His daughter Mallory Reaves followed him into writing, co-authoring the later InterWorld sequels and helping him continue work after his Parkinson's diagnosis made independent composition increasingly difficult.
Death
Michael Reaves died on March 20, 2023, in Los Angeles, California, following a lengthy battle with Parkinson's disease. He was 72. Tributes from colleagues across the animation industry noted his warmth, his range, and his central role in making 1980s and 1990s American animation as ambitious as it was.2
References
Some content on this page was researched using the Ghostbusters Wiki on Fandom.
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"Michael Reaves," Wikipedia, accessed June 13, 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Reaves
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Ghostbusters News, "Michael Reaves, Real Ghostbusters and Batman: The Animated Series writer, dead at 72" (March 22, 2023). https://ghostbustersnews.com/2023/03/22/michael-reaves-real-ghostbusters-batman-the-animated-series-writer-dead-at-72/
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"Heart of Ice (Batman: The Animated Series)," Wikipedia, accessed June 13, 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_Ice_(Batman:_The_Animated_Series)
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CBR, "Michael Reaves, Emmy-Winning Batman, Gargoyles and Spider-Man Writer Dies at 72" (March 21, 2023). https://www.cbr.com/michael-reaves-obituary/
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Ghostbusters: Get Real Issue #1 (IDW Publishing, 2015), p. 9, panel 5. The episode-info folder held by Janine Melnitz lists the writer of "Janine Melnitz, Ghostbuster" as "M. Reaves."
