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Synopsis:
Shana gets a chance at a new career as a fashion designer. She hesitates since it means she won't have time for the upcoming tour. But Jem and the rest of the Holograms realize that it's Shana's big chance to make it as a top designer, and suggests to have a talent search for a new drummer.

Characters:
Jem/Jerrica and the Holograms, Raya, The Misfits, Jetta, Synergy, Rio, Eric, Lin-Z, Starlight Girls (Ashley, Ba Nee, Krissie, Deirdre, Anne, Marianne, Joellen, Nancy, Delaree), Anthony, Craig, actress Liz Stratton, Barry music store owner, Raya's father Miguel, Raya's brothers (Enrique, Aurelio, Roberto), Raya's mother Rosa.

Focus on:
Shana, Jetta, Raya, Aja.

Locations & vehicles:
Starlight Mansion, Anthony's car, Liz Stratton's mansion, Starlight Music, record store, VTV, radiostation, Misfits Music, club, club where Jetta is discovered, Barry's music store, Alonso's Nursery, Alonso's Nursery van, Alonso's house, japanese restaurant.

First appearance of:
Raya, Jetta, Craig, Miguel Raya's father, Rosa Raya's mother, Raya's brothers (Enrique, Aurelio, Roberto), Alonso's house, Alonso's Nursery, Alonso's Nursery van, Anthony's car.

Songs:
"I Like Your Style" The Misfits
"Believe In Yourself" Jem and the Holograms
"I've Got My Eye On You" Jem and the Holograms

Genres:
Drama, Romance, Message, Humor.

Original airdate:
21 September 1987.

Releases:
Released on VHS. Released on DVD.

International:
Italy: Aired on TV. The episode title was "Nuovi Elementi - prima parte" (New members - first part).
France: Aired on TV. Released on DVD. The episode title was "La Recherche Des Talents (1)" (The Talents Search).
Venezuela: Aired on TV. The episode title was "Concurso De Bateristas 1" (Drummer contest 1).
Australia: Released on VHS.
New Zealand: Released on VHS.

Behind the Scenes:
This episode was originally numbered 29.

Hasbro wanted to add new dolls to the doll line, and told Christy what they looked like and what instrument they were going to play. Christy was told Raya was going to be a hispanic doll, and Jetta would play a saxophone.

When Hasbro first told Christy about the new character Raya, she started looking up "Raya" to see if it meant anything in Spanish, she didn't find much that made sense. So Christy came up with the idea of Raya just being a nickname that her father gave her. The last name Alonso was the name of a hispanic person Christy knew who owned a big kite factory.

Christy was very much into designing clothes as a child. So it was only natural for Christy to come up with that for Shana.

Jetta was first meant to play bass guitar before it was changed to a saxophone.

Christy wanted to make Jetta black, and took this up on a meeting with Sunbow who didn't think it would be a good idea to have a black character as a bad guy, but she could be British or Australian. Christy couldn't help laughing at them about it, but decided to go for British.

It was important for Christy to have a real British actor play the part of Jetta, and not an american making a bad accent. Sunbow decided to do auditions and send the recordings of the finalists to Christy, for her to pick the voice actress she wanted. Sunbow sent Christy a tape of four different women who had read for the part of Jetta, and the three first were americans doing bad british accents, but the fourth was British actress Louise Dorsey (daughter of the famous British pop singer Engelbert Humperdinck). Christy told Sunbow she wanted Louise, and so she got the part.

Christy's notes to the animation artists for animating the character Craig Phillips was "muscular, devastatingly handsome, and since Craig is actually Stormer's brother you may wish to draw him with subtle facial resemblances, same hair and eye color".

When Liz Stratton says orange is her unlucky color, it's an injoke by Christy who was married to Peter Ledger at the time who was working on an animated movie called "the Chipmunks", painting backgrounds, and one of the producers decided that she didn't like the color orange, so he could no longer use orange when he painted backgrounds.

With all the orphans on the show, Christy liked the idea of throwing an entire functional family into the mix, Raya's family.

One of the original ideas Christy had for this episode was for one of Raya's brothers to get involved with gangs and stealing the Rockin' Roadster from Jem. But that idea was cut out because they had too much material already.

One of the other contestants of the Talent Search, the female one who says she played with bands like Static Moss, the Big Apes and the Nasties, was for some reason described in detail by Christy in her script as a "tough girl, tough looking, nasty voice, young woman wearing black leather and red lace, with black hair and a small red arrowpierced heart painted on her cheek", and the animator went with it.

Trivia:
This was the first episode that featured the second Jem Theme.

Shana plays both guitar and drums, but until this episodes she hadn't played guitar in ages according to herself. Kimber plays drums aswell, but Aja or Jerrica don't.

Shana doesn't take part of any of the songs in this episode.

Liz Stratton was not directly based on any person, but Christy had said to the animation artist to think of Joan Collins.

This episode about a talent search was of course long before talent shows like American Idol.

The Starlight Girls help Jem and the Holograms with promotion.

The Misfits went looking at clubs for a fourth member only to top Jem and the Holograms and their talent search. Stormer liked the idea of a fourth Misfit, because it means a new instrument, a fuller sound, more complex music, Roxy didn't.

Jetta was part of the band Tinkerbillies before she joined the Misfits. "Tinkerbilly" is derogatory slang for a pseudo-rock'n'roller someone pretending to be something he's not.

The first song Jetta played with the Misfits was before she was actually a member, "I Like Your Style".

When the Misfits first meet Jetta, she doesn't have a work permit which means she can't legally work in the USA. But Harvey Gabor's lawyers took care of that.

Craig came back to the USA from Europe just in time for the Talent Search, to visit his sister Stormer.

In the music video "Believe in Yourself" by Jem and the Holograms, we get to see Raya playing drums as a little child, she had the same haircolor even then.

When Raya discovers Jem's real identity she actually recognizes who Jerrica is, which probably means Jerrica is kinda famous too.

Raya always wanted sisters, she has three brothers.

Raya has blue eyes, while the rest of her family has brown eyes.

The song "I've Got My Eye On You" by Jem and the Holograms is re-used. Previously appeared in the episode "Kimber's Rebellion".

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