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TV PREVIEW DMISOTROICNT &9
SPECIAL
Ten years! Duncan Jones and
Your essential guide to all Sharlto Copley speak
the biggest binges
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A hurricane. An alligator. Alexandre
NOS4A2 ISSUE 161 £5.25 Aja. The monster hit of the summer
Zachary Quinto goes evil in the
darkest, craziest TV show of 2019
SFN 161 WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
Welcome
As genre fans, it feels like
we remember the big moments
from our childhood a little
more powerfully than everyone
else when it comes to the pop
culture stuff. Whether it’s Star
Wars, Gremlins, Jurassic Park, The X-Files,
Toy Story or the new generation growing
up with the MCU, there will be films and TV
shows that you witness at the exact right age
to make them stay with you forever. It’s not
just a memory, it’s a feeling.
For many of us, Jim Henson’s The Dark
Crystal is one of those films that provokes
a visceral sense of nostalgia and, frankly,
terror. It was a window into another world
entirely, a realm in which there was good
and evil but the latter was so absolutely
terrifying and seemingly all-powerful that it
genuinely felt like the heroes might not save
the day. We talk a lot about how kids films
were scarier back in the day, but for proof
just show an adult of a certain age a picture
of the Skeksis and watch their face change.
Which is why it was such a thrill to go
on set for Netflix’s The Dark Crystal: Age
Of Resistance. This is no casual cash-in, no,
these are real puppets created by people
who actually created the original film
(including the great Brian Froud) and we
can’t wait to be taken back to that kingdom
of dreams and nightmares.
Speaking of nightmares, we’ve got a first
look at Alexandre Aja’s alligator home
invasion horror Crawl, André Øvredal tells
us all about Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark,
and we speak to showrunner Jami O’Brien
about bringing Joe Hill’s terrifying NOS4A2
to TV. On a lighter note, we’re celebrating
the tenth birthdays of two of the most
important sci-fi films of the modern era as we
talk to Duncan Jones about Moon and chat
all things District 9 with Sharlto Copley.
We’ve also got a massive TV preview
in store for you, led by two Garth Ennis
projects: the fourth and final season of
Preacher, and the first outing for The Boys.
From The Witcher to Watchmen to His
Dark Materials, there’s a whole lot of great
genre telly coming your way in the second
half of 2019 and we cannot wait. Get the
popcorn ready…
Jonathan Hatfull
Editor
004 |
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK GET EXCITED ABOUT
GEMINI MAN
The concept for Gemini Man has been hanging
around Hollywood for a while and it’s easy to see
why: the world’s greatest hitman being hunted by
a cloned version of his younger self is a great idea,
but if you can’t sell an audience on the idea that
it’s the same person, you don’t have a movie. Ang
Lee might seem like a surprising choice to finally
bring the dream to fruition but he loves his tech
(remember Life Of Pi?) and he can make one hell
of an action spectacle. Here’s hoping this is the
blockbuster Will Smith needs.
| 005
SCIFINOW 161 18 CTHRYESDTAARLK
Contents 08
PORTAL WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
08 MULAN
We’re in the thick of Disney ‘live-action’ reboots but this is
the one to get excited about.
10 FRIGHTFEST
Prepare yourselves for five days of horror excellence.
17 RIP VERTIGO COMICS
Paying tribute to DC’s trailblazing, Hellblazing imprint.
FEATURES
18 THE DARK CRYSTAL
Take a trip back to your childhood nightmares as we go
on set for The Age Of Resistance and find out how classic
techniques are being used to make a new classic.
26 JIM HENSON’S BEST CREATIONS
From Hoggle to the Fraggle Rock gang via The Witches, here
are our favourite Henson creations.
30 CRAWL
Alexandre Aja and Kaya Scodelario take us inside their
white-knuckle creature horror with teeth.
36 NOS4A2
We talk to showrunner Jami O’Brien about turning Joe Hill’s
wickedly dark fantasy novel into one of the must-see TV hits
of 2019.
40 MEMORY: THE ORIGIN OF ALIEN
The new documentary that uncovers how a SF masterpiece
was born.
46 DUNCAN JONES
We talk to the filmmaker about ten years of Moon and what
he’s got in store for us in future.
60 TV PREVIEW
Finished Game Of Thrones and Stranger Things? Good,
because 2019’s TV schedule is just getting started.
PLUS:
The Boys, Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark, Aniara, Preacher
REVIEWS
72 SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING
How did Peter Parker fare in a post-Endgame world?
73 MIDSOMMAR
Was Ari Aster’s Hereditary follow-up the folk horror
nightmare we’d dreamed of?
79 THE BOYS
The outrageous superhero smackdown comic comes to TV.
BOOK CLUB
82 AUTHORS ON AUTHORS
Brian Naslund writes about the bloody genius of
Joe Abercrombie.
88 EVAN WINTER
Talking action and epic fantasy with the author of The Rage
Of Dragons.
PLUS:
All the latest book reviews…
TIMEWARP
90 HP LOVECRAFT
The complete guide to one of the most influential and
controversial authors in genre history.
100 DISTRICT 9
Ten years of Neill Blomkamp’s prescient alien occupation SF.
PLUS:
The Brood, Alien, Alice In Wonderland
006 |
26
36 MEET THE TEAM
FREEALITA: BATTLE 60 yQo.uWmhoiscthams oavkieid/?TV show terrified
ANGEL GIFTS
90 100 JONATHAN HATFULL
Details on page 111
EDITOR
EVERY ISSUE
AMwTLooh.yhsyRttb’sIarAolfoiadtrvhckeeeerrhmssoheOrorltowifnrigTnshogmemmayuecbhe.
112 SUBSCRIPTIONS
ABIGAIL CHANDLER
Subscribe to the magazine and
save money today. DEPUTY EDITOR
114 NEXT ISSUE A. Death
Becomes Her
Your first sneak-peek at the next I saw a trailer and had
issue of SciFiNow. nightmares about having a
hole in my belly.
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POPPY-JAY PALMER
NEWS EDITOR
IIAeevcwp.eaiasCruosyghdwshaethatreaolmkrnneeeddeIdrsbwauyndedntdrotoe.mnllsly
MARCUS FAINT
ART EDITOR
ABsSktiApad.eiCnrLcaKasipfiebOcpqyaeuFlredFlyinnGcctthhehoielbdwMl.iintYhCoKtuEhinsegch! er
RACHAEL HARPER
SUB EDITOR
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| 007
chaX
PORTAL Your essential, trustworthy
and unrivalled guide to the
latest genre happenings
ODNISYHOOUNR OCOUWR
Everything we know about Disney’s live-action remake of Mulan…
WORDS POPPY-JAY PALMER
AFTER A FALSE start almost a decade ago, NO SONGS? to borrow more from the folksong ‘The Ballad
Of Mulan’ than the animated film, based on
Disney got cracking on a live-action remake of Though it’s one of the least musically heavy the story of the legendary Chinese warrior Hua
its 1998 animated film Mulan in 2015 and we Disney musicals, weighing in with just five songs, Mulan. In the animated version, the heroine
finally got a first glimpse of the product of its if we’re including the end credits bop ‘True To is still a young Chinese woman who disguises
efforts when the studio posted the film’s trailer. Your Heart’ by 98 Degrees and Stevie Wonder, herself as man to serve in the Imperial Army
It logged more than 175 million views in its first Mulan featured some cracking bangers. The film to protect her ailing father, but it diverges from
24 hours, including 52 million from China alone. kicked off with ‘Honour To Us All’ to introduce us the original folksong. In ‘The Ballad Of Mulan’,
But we’re not surprised though, it’s pretty heroic. to the heroine’s life, millions know the words to Mulan disguised herself and left for the army
‘I’ll Make A Man Out Of You’ (or have it on their with her parents’ blessing, rather than cutting
THE TRAILER workout playlists at least), ‘A Girl Worth Fighting off her hair and fleeing her family home under
For’ was the perfect comic relief tune just before the cover of night, and she already had all the
The first trailer for the film was everything the film got dark, and ballad ‘Reflection’ has skills — martial arts, archery, sword fighting —
we could have asked for: it included all the earned its place in many a Disney songbook when she enlisted. She served for 12 years, still
best scenes from the animated film, from the and has also gone on to be something of a disguised as a man, before turning down an
tea ceremony with the Matchmaker and the LGBTQ+ classic. However, director Niki Caro has official post in order to return to her family. We
army training montage, to the deadly mountain said that the new film won’t be a musical, but it love the Disney classic, but the studio heavily
pass avalanche and Mulan running across the does sound as though the classic songs will still Westernised the tale and made a lot of changes,
rooftops of the royal palace in her bid to save be worked into it in the form of instrumentals. so we’re excited to see some of those changes
China. The remake looks more like a Wuxia epic reverted back in the live-action version.
than a Disney musical adventure, but we’re very HISTORICAL ACCURACY Mulan will be in cinemas from 27 March 2020.
much okay with that. One thing that audiences
did notice about the trailer is that there was a Though the film is a live-action remake of
lack of Mushu, the dragon guardian voiced by Disney’s Mulan, it seems as though it’s going
Eddie Murphy in the animated film. But there’s
no need to panic: Disney has confirmed that
Mushu will, in fact, appear in the remake.
CASTING The film is reportedly as inspired by the
original folk song as the Disney film.
After that weird rumour floating around that
suggested Scarlet Johansson would be taking on
the role of Mulan in the remake, we’re pleased
to know that Disney ended up hiring a largely
Chinese cast. Chinese-American actress, singer
and model Liu Yifei (Hanson And The Beast)
is taking on the title role, while Donnie Yen is
playing Mulan’s mentor Commander Tung;
Jet Li is the Emperor of China; Nelson Lee is
the Chancellor, the Emperor’s advisor; Jason
Scott Lee is Bori Khan, a Hun warrior intent on
avenging the death of his father; Cheng Pei-pei
is the Matchmaker, the woman who judges
potential brides; Yoson An is Chen Honghui,
a recruit who becomes Mulan’s ally and love
interest (basically the equivalent of the animated
film’s Shang); and Tzi Ma and Rosalind Chao
are Mulan’s parents, Hua Zhou and Hua Li.
008 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK | 009
PORTAL
FRIGHTFEST RETURNS
The UK’s festival of fear is back with a record-breaking 20th anniversary line-up WORDS JONATHAN HATFULL
Oh yes, horror fans, it’s that time of year There will be Øvredal’s Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark!
again. The August bank holiday is nearly upon blood...lots. As always, there’s an excellent retro selection,
us, which means it’s time to head to London’s
Leicester Square for Arrow Films FrightFest and Horror fans have already been keeping a very including Cronenberg’s original Rabid and Dario
five bloody days of the best new horror films from close eye on the likes of Daniel Isn’t Real (from Argento’s Tenebrae. The Italian maestro himself
around the world. Some Kind Of Hate’s Adam Egypt Mortimer), is making a comeback to the festival and will be
Nekrontik (the latest by Wyrmwood director Kiah on hand to talk all things horror with Alan Jones.
Regulars know that it’s always a treat to Roache-Turner) and ‘splatterpunk action comedy’ We’re also very excited about The Magnificent
see what the team has in store for us and they Why Don’t You Just Die!, which is also a strong Obsession Of Michael Reeves, a documentary
have pulled out all the stops for their 20th year. contender for best title of the festival in the face of about the brilliant and all-too-brief career of the
There are (deep breath, everyone) 78 films stiff competition. director of Witchfinder General.
from 14 countries with 20 world premieres, 20
international premieres and 28 UK premieres. Eddie Marsan makes a rare horror appearance We’ve barely scratched the surface here,
in Feedback, Seann William Scott goes serial but whatever you’re looking for, you’re sure to
Where to start? Well, let’s look at the returning killer in Bloodline, Lawrie Brewster is back with find your particular horror tastes catered for at
favourites. The Soska Sisters are finally back at international anthology For We Are Many, and FrightFest, and first-timers should be assured:
the fest after wowing with American Mary back Brit horrors Tales From The Lodge (starring you’re in for a treat. The atmosphere is a huge
in 2013, and we can’t wait for their remake of Mackenzie Crook and Johnny Vegas) and Dark part of experience as like-minded souls gather
David Cronenberg’s Rabid. The brilliant Lucky Encounter (with Alice Lowe and Laura Fraser) for a celebration of all things blood-curdling. We
McKee (The Woman) will be there with his latest promise to continue the excellent wave of recent cannot wait.
horror Kindred Spirits, genre icon Larry Fessenden home-grown chillers.
is bringing his fantastic riff on Frankenstein Arrow Films FrightFest runs from 22-26 August
Depraved, veteran producer Travis Stevens has his Opening the festival is Ant Timpson’s fully at Cineworld Leicester Square and The Prince
much-buzzed directorial debut Girl On The Third batshit-sounding Come To Daddy, starring Elijah Charles Cinema. Tickets are available from
Floor, and speaking of The Woman, Pollyanna Wood, while Abner Pastoll (Road Games) closes www.frightfest.co.uk/tickets.html For more
McIntosh is making her directorial debut with her the festivities with thriller A Good Woman Is Hard information on the event and films screening,
follow-up to that shocking bloody satire: Darlin’. To Find, in which Sarah Bolger will go to any visit www.frightfest.co.uk
lengths to keep her kids safe.
Expect a great “Tickets are on
range of films. Oh, and you can get a first look at upcoming sale now!”
horror hits like Alexandre Aja’s Crawl and André
010 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
Page 011, SciFiNow, Issue 161
CASTING CALL
The latest exciting cast additions to the most intriguing projects… WORDS POPPY-JAY PALMER
The Little Bill & Ted Face The Invisible Man
Mermaid The Music
EXPECTED RELEASE
EXPECTED RELEASE EXPECTED RELEASE
13 March 2020
TBA Summer 2020
Cecilia (Elisabeth Moss) suspects that her supposedly
ROLES ROLES dead, abusive ex isn’t quite dead after all.
ARIEL: Female, 18-25 years JOANNA: Female, 30-40 years old, ROLES
old, any ethnicity. Looking for Caucasian. Bill’s wife.
someone with the singing chops UNNAMED MAN: Male, 30-40 years old, African-American.
to live up to the Disney princess. ELIZABETH: As above. Ted’s wife. The character isn’t written yet so this is a broad audition.
The mermaid tail is not required.
CONTACT UNNAMED WOMAN: Female, 30-40 years old, Caucasian.
URSULA: Female, 40-60 years Again, we’ll have whoever.
old, any ethnicity. The villainous [email protected]
CONTACT
sea witch originally inspired REPLIES
by legendary drag queen Divine. [email protected]
Jayma Mays, Erinn Hayes
We are not casting a drag REPLIES
queen though.
Aldis Hodge, Harriet Dyer
SCUTTLE: Any gender, any age,
any ethnicity. We just want
someone funny to play a
human seagull. Is that too
much to ask for?
FLOUNDER: Male, 10-15 years
old, any ethnicity. Looking for
someone adorable who could
make a fish his own.
CONTACT The Craft
[email protected]
REPLIES
Halle Bailey, Melissa McCarthy,
Awkwafina, Jacob Tremblay
EXPECTED RELEASE Space Jam 2 ROLES
TBA EXPECTED RELEASE UNNAMED MAN: Male, 40+
years old, Black. Someone
ROLE We’ve no idea who can combine awards-
HANNAH: Female, 16-25 years LeBron James is working season cred with established
old, Caucasian. Equivalent of tirelessly to bring Space Jam franchise experience. A
Robin Tunney’s Sarah Bailey in
the original film. No witchcraft back and he’s looking for veteran of the MCU, maybe.
quality actors to help him
experience necessary. CONTACT
make it a thing again.
CONTACT [email protected]
[email protected] REPLIES
REPLIES Don Cheadle
Cailee Spaeny
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK | 011
PORTAL
WEDDING FROM HELL
We talk to the co-writer and producer of new horror comedy Camp Wedding WORDS KATHERINE MCLAUGHLIN
“Shaun Of The Dead was always a order and people got vacuumed to death! The real life and I unfriended her on Facebook. She
characters were inspired by ourselves but taking confronted me in a parking lot saying how dare
touchstone,” explains co-writer and executive the worst aspects of our personalities and then you unfriend me! It was this new world of what it
producer of Camp Wedding, Cara Consilvio. blowing them up. Then we carried them into means to be friends with someone.”
The horror comedy, directed and co-written by Camp Wedding,” explains Consilvio.
her close friend Greg Emetaz, is loosely based The film throws knives, masked maniacs,
on Consilvio’s own wedding where she gathered On the matter of social media faux pas’ and possession and Teddy Ruxpin at the audience
her friends and family at an abandoned summer how odd it was to experience the shift from an but at its heart it’s all about the quandaries
camp she rented on Airbnb. analogue world, Consilvio says: “I did a second of true friendship: “As you get older you feel
degree in 2007-2010 right when Facebook was like you lose connection to friends,” Consilvio
Emetaz, who was Man of Honour at really appealing to the masses. One of the things explains, “and the only connection you have is
Consilvio’s nuptials, elaborates on Edgar that shocked me about going back to school was through social media but it’s not really a truthful
Wright’s influence: “The thing I liked about what happened in Facebook groups seemed depiction of how people are really doing.”
Shaun Of The Dead was that it was hilarious to be more important than what happened in Camp Wedding is available on iTunes and
but also grounded. It felt like these were real real life. I remember I had an argument with digital platforms from 20 August.
people and they had this weird interpersonal someone and she stopped speaking to me in
stuff that was vying with the actual danger in the
movie. In this case, the big idea was that these IRL danger for
are people who are not really communicating socials obssessives.
and are forced to or they’re going to perish.
I’ve described it as like a wedding comedy
that stumbles into a horror summer camp, but
because they’re only communicating via text
message the tone doesn’t get conveyed so both
genres are interweaving upon each other.”
The result is a rambunctiously funny and
surprisingly sweet satire of social media and
phone addiction told from a Xennial perspective
where IRL friendship is key to survival. It nails the
strange ever-changing meaning of friendship in
the digital age with Friday The 13th-style horror
shenanigans and takes aim at its characters in
a similar manner to Severance. The filmmakers
lovingly poke fun at themselves, taking
inspiration from their grad film, Neat Freak. “It
was about an obsessive-compulsive poltergeist,
but instead of causing disorder it imposed
012 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
WWEEIERKDEND ‘ABnurebxstewnidll ebde cut of The
playing.
Get obscure with this Glasgow
film festival alternative ending. Joe Dante will also join the these? That’s all part of the fun!
audience via Skype for a post-screening Q&A. An Arrow Video-sponsored cult film quiz is
WORDS JOSH SLATER-WILLIAMS
Among other highlights of the 13-event among the non-film event highlights, alongside
From programming collective programme are a rare screening of Tilda a panel discussion on the phenomenon of
Swinton’s triple-role tour-de-force Teknolust Deepfakes, with prominent Deepfake creator Ctrl
Matchbox Cineclub, who run the annual (2002), Czech maverick Vera Chytilová’s Shift Face in person.
KeanuCon and Cage-a-rama festivals in horror effort Wolf Hole (1987), and brand-new Weird Weekend runs 30 August to 1
Glasgow, comes the second edition of Weird 2K restorations of such intriguing-sounding September at the CCA in Glasgow. Visit
Weekend: a cult film festival focused on titles as I Was a Teenage Serial Killer (1993) matchboxcineclub.com for further details.
showcasing a diverse range of strange and and Split (1989). Haven’t heard of most of
unusual movies that have slipped through the
cracks of cinematic history.
With limited exceptions, they screen films
you won’t easily find through DVD, streaming,
or, sometimes, any distribution at all. Some
play from vintage prints, others are screened in
brand-new restorations.
One highlight this year is a 35mm
screening of long-unavailable Bill Murray
sci-fi comedy Nothing Lasts Forever (1984),
which also stars Gremlins’ Zach Galligan. And
on that Joe Dante note, there will be a 30th
anniversary outing for the workprint cut of The
’Burbs (1989), with extended scenes and an
PORTAL
BLOODY HELL
As the BBC releases the first image of their
brand-new Dracula, we take a look at what
to expect from the series
WORDS ABIGAIL CHANDLER
Dracula is one of those stories that no-one
can leave alone. This time Steven Moffat and
Mark Gatiss will be telling the Count’s story in
three feature-length episodes on the BBC.
Unlike with their Sherlock adaptation,
they’re leaving Dracula in 1897, the year in
which Bram Stoker’s book was written, and the
Victorian horror will be led by Danish actor
Claes Bang (The Girl In The Spider’s Web) as
Count Dracula. The first image from the show
reveals him splattered in blood, with bloodshot
eyes and nails that could use a good manicure.
The rest of the cast has been filled in, but no
announcements have been made on who will be
playing the book’s other iconic characters.
The cast currently includes John Heffernan
(Collateral); Morfydd Clark (Pride And Prejudice
And Zombies); Lujza Richter (Phantom Thread);
Clive Russell (Game Of Thrones); Sacha Dhawan
(Iron Fist); Joanna Scanlan (The Woman In
White); Dolly Wells (Can You Ever Forgive Me?);
Nathan Stewart-Jarrett (Utopia); and, of course,
Mark Gatiss, who will be taking a role as well
as co-writing. Gatiss has previously said that
Renfield would be his number one choice of role,
but it’s not yet confirmed whether that is who
he will be playing. With this being Moffat and
Gatiss, there’s also a chance that some of the
roles will have been gender-swapped.
Moffat and Gatiss have promised that the
series will see Dracula as ‘the hero of his own
story’, rather than just the terrifying monster he
is in the novel, in which he is only ever viewed
through the eyes of others. The show is currently
filming, and, while a release date hasn’t been
confirmed yet, it is thought it could arrive on
screens in time for this Christmas or New Year.
TThHe rEeboGot AnoMoneEsaCw OcomNingT…INUES
It’s usually best to take most ‘wtf’ Max Minghella
(The Handmaid’s
franchise news with a pinch of salt. However, Tale, Horns) as Rock’s partner,
it turns out that Chris Rock was absolutely not and Marisol Nichols (Riverdale) as his boss.
messing about when he announced that he Franchise veteran Darren Lynn Bousman,
was helping to reboot the Saw series. Filming who helmed Saws II through IV, is back
is now well underway on the latest film, behind the camera and Jigsaw duo Pete
described as the “next level of Saw on full Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg have written
tilt” by Lionsgate chairman Joe Drake. the screenplay based on Rock’s concept.
Rock will star in the film as a detective Honestly, we still can’t really believe that
investigating a string of gruesome crimes, this is happening but we are absolutely
with his father played by none other than thrilled that it is.
Samuel L Jackson. The cast also includes
014 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
BEST FILM HOT NEWS RUNNER UP
Posters
BEST OF THE BILLBOARDS
Celebrating the best, worst and weirdest movie posters out there
WORDS POPPY-JAY PALMER
MULAN
This artwork for Disney’s live-
action remake of Mulan takes
inspiration from the original
poster for the animated version.
BEST OF TV
PREACHER
SEASON FOUR
This new poster represents
everything we want from of
Preacher Season Four: hellfire
and Jesse looking smug as heck.
CREEPIEST
AVENGERS: ENDGAME EXTENDED CUT ANNABELLE
COMES HOME
It’s quite ballsy to include a huge spoiler in the promotional material for your film, but Marvel went ahead and did it anyway with
this gorgeous poster for the extended cut of Avengers: Endgame. Although we figure almost everyone who would go to see an This poster for Annabelle Comes
extended cut would have already seen the original film… Anyway, the point is the poster is pretty enough to get over the fact that Home is doing a great job at
the ‘extended cut’ was more or less the same film with just a couple of extras tacked onto it. giving us the willies.
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK | 015
PORTAL © ©2019 Jonathan Burton from The Folio Society’s edition of George R R Martin’s A Game of Thrones
© ©2019 Jonathan Burton from The Folio Society’s edition of George R R Martin’s A Game of Thrones
TCHOENGTAINMUEES
The Folio Society is taking us back
to Westeros with new editions of
George R R Martin’s books
WORDS ABIGAIL CHANDLER
The TV show might be over, but books don’t
die that easily. George RR Martin is still working
on the remaining books in his A Song Of Ice And
Fire series, but The Folio Society are giving fans
a chance to enjoy the existing books anew, in
beautifully-bound and illustrated editions.
The new illustrations, by Jonathan Burton, will
give readers the chance to shake off their mental
images of the TV show and revisit the books
with fresh eyes, and a new introduction by Joe
Abercrombie will explore the series’ impact on
the fantasy genre. And for those fans of the show
who still haven’t got around to reading the source
material, it’s the perfect chance to delve into a far
richer take on Westeros than the show had room
to bring to life.
The Folio Society are beginning with a two-
volume edition of A Game Of Thrones, with the
other books in the series set to follow. This edition
includes a wealth of supporting material, including
a fold-out map and family trees.
The Folio Society edition of George R R Martin’s A
Game Of Thrones, introduced by Joe Abercrombie
and illustrated by Jonathan Burton, is available
exclusively from www.FolioSociety.com
Jonathan Burton’s
illustrations dazzle.
Behold the mighty Folio
Society slipcase...
...housing a beautiful WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
two-volume edition.
016 |
DC Comics has announced the closure of 2 HELLBLAZER 4 PREACHER
its Vertigo imprint after 26 fantastic years. This John Constantine-starring book may After absolutely smashing it on Hellblazer,
Launched by editor Karen Berger, Vertigo have started life in the main DC Universe, but its the brilliant Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon
was intended to be the home of DC’s more success was one of the things that encouraged launched their very own blasphemous road-
adult, creator-led books that, with just a few DC to launch an imprint specifically for titles tripping epic, Preacher, which solidified Ennis’
exceptions, had no ties whatsoever to the main like Hellblazer. It went on to run for 300 gleefully violent and subversive style, and did
DC Universe. issues before the character was folded back things that we still can’t quite believe they got
into the DCU, but he’s soon set to return in away with.
DC has also announced that it has dropped
its Zoom and Ink imprints, and will instead be “MELTINTHYEDTERLHAWEOSTOSULORRISGELD’IOSEOSNB”FEESTOTHFE 5 Y: THE LAST MAN
dividing its books into three imprints that will be Brian K Vaughan and Pia Guerra’s
defined by age, named DC Kids, DC, and DC John Constantine, Hellblazer as part of DC’s fantastic story about the last man alive after a
Black Label. Ongoing Vertigo books will Sandman Universe. horrific plague wipes out all other males is still
be moved to the Black Label imprint as of being discovered by new readers today, and
January 2020. 3 FABLES is most definitely as relevant now as it was in
Bill Willingham and Mark Buckingham 2002. The success of this comic is what kicked
So, as we say goodbye to an imprint that were bringing fairy tale characters into the real Vaughan’s career into high gear, meaning we
literally changed the face of comics, let’s take a world long before Once Upon A Time did it, can thank Vertigo for the likes of Saga and
look back at some of Vertigo’s best books. and their take on the subject is infinitely smarter, Paper Girls.
darker and funnier. The series ran for 13 years,
1THE SANDMAN and had numerous spin-offs, creating a whole SPECIAL MENTIONS
Neil Gaiman’s universe-trotting fantasy epic Fables universe within Vertigo. The sheer scope of Vertigo is simply too
is rightly hailed as one of the greatest comic wide for a top-five really, so let’s not forget
book series ever made, and his world of the that the imprint also launched, or at least
Endless – including Dream, Death and their boosted, the careers of the likes of Grant
siblings – is one of literature’s best mythologies. Morrison, Brian Azzarello, Warren Ellis,
DC is currently revisiting Gaiman’s world in its Scott Snyder, Mike Carey, G Willow Wilson,
new Sandman Universe, which will continue and Jeff Lemire.
under its Black Label.
F“OTYHOREKU?QO”CUWRFEYTSE?HTATIEOHNDENSAQWHRUKAEERSCSRNTTHYIEOSEVNTBEAIRIGLS:B:AQECEGUANEEN:SOCTAIFAOPRNNUEPSSAPISFEPTRTUAOPPNPMICCEKTTEHMUEPASAKEET
WORDS ABIGAIL CHANDLER
COVER FEATURE
The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance
huge warehouse complex just outside of London is the last place you’d expect The film will feature groundbreaking puppets effects work in
to find a magical forest dwelling, vast but built for inhabitants just half the much the same way that the original Jim Henson film did. It’s
size of the average human. And yet that’s where SciFiNow found itself, hiding a mixture of new techniques and classic designs.
behind a tree, watching as Louis Leterrier gave directions to a cluster of three-
foot-high elf-like creatures, all decked out like a militia clothed in armour made WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
from the natural world. The creatures turn their faces to Leterrier as he talks to
them, nodding along in understanding, before taking up their start positions
and running the take again. It’s only when you look closely that you spot the
puppeteers crouched in a trench beneath the set, their hands raised above their
heads, operating the puppets while watching screens that show them what’s
happening above them.
If, like many children of the Eighties, your nights were haunted by images of Skeksis and
horrifyingly long-legged creatures running across alien landscapes, then you would recognise this
little elf militia immediately – they are Gelfling, the stars of Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal, and the
returning stars of Netflix and The Jim Henson Company’s The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance.
The ten-part series is set years before the film, with the monstrous Skeksis acting as the seemingly
benevolent overlords of the Gelfling race, bending the magical powers of the Crystal for their own
evil purposes and corrupting the land around them. The series follows three Gelfling who stumble
across the Skeksis’ true intentions, and are forced to make a stand against them to protect their
people and their land from annihilation.
Despite the original film being 37 years old, it has never really gone away – both in a literal sense
and a figurative one. It has lived on in tie-in novels and comic books, but also in the hearts of those
who were entranced by it in their youth, and those are the very same people who are now bringing
it back. “The Dark Crystal is a movie I saw a little too young, it shocked me a little bit and never left
my mind,” director and producer Louis Leterrier says. He tells us it’s the sort of film he has returned to
time and again throughout his life and his career, finding multiple layers in it. He calls it “this weird
UFO of a movie that didn’t belong in the Eighties. It was ahead of its time and a little bit obsolete at
the same time because it was done with puppets,” and says it’s “this ugly-beautiful thing that you can’t
stop watching, it’s mesmerising”.
Leterrier’s involvement in the project dates back to shortly after the release of his film Clash Of The
Titans, when he asked his agent to set up a meeting for him with The Jim Henson Company, simply
because he’d always been such a huge fan of their work. At the time the Henson Company had been
trying to get a Dark Crystal sequel off the ground for a while, and they asked Leterrier to come on
board, but a round of pitching to studios in 2012 came to nothing. “[A]ll the studios were just like
‘nah, we want Transformers’,” Leterrier says of the film climate at the time, adding that many people
just didn’t know what The Dark Crystal was: “They were like ‘oh yeah, the David Bowie movie!’ I’m
like ‘no, the other one…’” he says, referring to The Jim Henson Company’s other nightmare-inducing
Eighties classic Labyrinth.
But those initial rejections ended up being a boon for the project, as Leterrier was finding himself
less and less interested in telling the story of a sequel. “[T]here was a whole bunch of elaborated
ideas from Jim Henson and Frank Oz, the story that led to the movie, and that stuff was so interesting
to me that eventually I was like, you know what? I’d love to take a look at what happened before
the movie. It’s such a big canvas that it might not even be a movie, it might be a series.” And so
they worked the project up as a prequel series, bringing on board a pair of writers, Jeff Addiss and
Will Matthews, who were massive fans of the film. Javier Grillo-Marxuach was added to the writing
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THE DARK CRYSTAL: AGE OF RESISTANCE
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A DARK CRYSTAL
GLOSSARY
THRA
The world in
which The
Dark Crystal
is set.
THE CRYSTAL
The Crystal is
the living heart
of Thra, but has
been turned into
a source of power by the Skeksis,
granting them eternal life.
URSKEKS
These creatures
were the first to
attempt to use
the Crystal. In
trying to purify themselves, they
accidentally split themselves into two
beings: Skeksis and Mystics.
SKEKSIS
Monstrous
creatures who
rule Thra,
drawing their
power by corrupting the Crystal.
MYSTICS
Peaceful
creatures who
are also known
as urRu. They
remain connected to their Skeksis
other-halves.
team later, as Addiss and Matthews were both real challenge began. Luckily, the UK – where GELFLING
inexperienced in running a writer’s room for a they chose to shoot the show – has a wealth of Elf-like creatures,
TV show. puppet knowledge, as the Jim Henson Creature often found
Shop has had a UK base for a number of years, living in harmony
Grillo-Marxuach tells us that when he came and the show was able to bring back some with nature.
on board he “figured we would need a number key players from the original film, including
of weeks to figure out what the long-term arc of some puppeteers – including Dave Goelz, the Skeksis castle. PODLINGS
the first season would be, and then I looked at puppeteer behind The Muppets’ Gonzo and The Small creatures
the bible and the pitch materials that these guys Dark Crystal’s Fizzgig – and, crucially, original who are
had written and it was so just involved that we concept artist Brian Froud, the man behind the employed as
were probably breaking story within a couple of distinctive look of The Dark Crystal. servants in the
days of us starting the writer’s room, in terms of
individual episodes, because part of selling it to Froud came on board to help translate LAND
Netflix and part of doing the work that they did the look of the film into the series. Where the STRIDERS
was really to figure all of this out.” film only featured two Gelfling, the series has Long-legged
upwards of 50 distinct Gelfling puppets, plus creatures that are
Luckily, selling it to Netflix had gone smoothly, entire, varied Gelfling civilisations. As the like horses, but
as they had finally found an executive who loved creator of the Gelfling, Froud was invaluable to far more terrifying.
The Dark Crystal as much as everyone else on the show. His job was to get the series’ designers
the team did, and who was keen to stay true to on the right page when it came to replicating
the film’s roots and do it with puppets. Everyone and expanding on the world of Thra. “In the
was thrilled – until they realised they had to beginning, oddly enough, it was all going
figure out how to tell a 10x60 minute drama awfully wrong, we couldn’t figure out why it was
series entirely with puppets. That’s where the
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COVER FEATURE
The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance
We’ll see more of the a fork?’” writer Grillo-Marxuach says, laughing,
world than ever before. but this is a genuine concern when working with
puppets. Something as simple as a character
going wrong. And I suddenly realised what they were doing was tidying my drawings up, and I picking something up and handing it to another
said to [them] ‘just for one minute imagine I mean what I draw,’ and that sorted it out. Because it character becomes a special effect when it’s
is actually very organic, it flows, it’s symmetrical. Once they understood that it just started really done with puppets rather than people. Puppets
coming together.” may be designed to have opposable thumbs, but
those thumbs don’t actually work. It’s something
Set decorator Richard Roberts was one of the people who had to work closely with Froud, and tells everyone needs to take into consideration, from
us that he found the process incredibly helpful: “He hasn’t been interfering and slowing stuff down, the writers and director – who need to really
which he could have if he wanted to, he could have been a real pain in the bum, but he’s been very consider how essential it is to the story every
helpful and very constructive.” Roberts adds that Froud’s reputation amongst the creatives working time they need a puppet to interact with a
on the show certainly helped: “All the guys making stuff for us, all the prop manufacturing people, prop – to the props and set departments, to the
they all grew up with The Dark Crystal. When [Froud] came in and met them they all pulled out their creature shop creatives themselves.
‘making of’ books and he was signing them, it was fantastic. It was like meeting a god for them.”
“There’s a thing called ‘puppetweight’ which
That very same ‘making of’ book, The World Of The Dark Crystal, was a crucial touchstone for we found out about from other people who
Age Of Resistance, and when we visited the creature workshop a well-thumbed copy of the book was have done puppet jobs,” explains prop master
laying on a table alongside the disembodied head of a Mystic. But when it came to creating the look Ty Teiger, when it comes to designing props for
of the series, it wasn’t a case of simply just copying or reusing things from the original film – not least puppets to use. “They’re heavy enough that they
because none of the original puppets were in a fit state to be reused, so even returning characters, can be attached to a stick which can then be
like the Skeksis Chamberlain, had to be recreated from scratch. The Henson Company had archived operated at a distance. Normally the hand of
photos from the original, which proved useful on Age Of Resistance, and Roberts tells us that they the puppet is attached to the prop rather than
came across some Skeksis candelabra from the film in a prop rental house, which they rented in the other way round.”
again “just for us, really”. But that was one of the very few number of things that they were able to
rent or buy for the series – Roberts tells us that “99%” of the things used in the show had to be made “I kept saying at the beginning ‘puppets do
especially for it. nothing’ and they thought I was joking,” Froud
chuckles, “they just laughed at me, they kept
Even Thra had to be more or less designed from scratch, something production designer Gavin laughing. Then two weeks in I had the director
Boquet was responsible for. “In the film you never really saw Thra particularly, it was very castle- and the cameraman come up to me and say
orientated. And the technology these days, with digital enhancement, you’ve got a chance to show ‘you were right, they don’t do anything, do
what a lot of the rest of this world is. I think the story obviously demanded that because they go to lots they?’” This might sound like a no-brainer, but
of different places, whereas in the film, apart from going through the forest or going to the Mystics’ until you’ve worked with puppets it’s impossible
lair, there wasn’t a lot of movement. So we had a lot of freedom.” Boquet says that “most of [Froud’s] to understand the challenges. “Puppets don’t do
illustration work is characters and forest, it’s not a lot of architecture,” so he had to figure out what very much, but you’ve got to create the illusion
Gelfling civilisations, like the grand city of Ha’Rar and the more rustic Stone-In-The-Wood, would look that they do everything,” Froud elaborates. “…
like, drawing inspiration from everything, from nature to the curving lines of modernist architecture, puppets are not actors in costumes, they’re not
while also ensuring that his team’s work lined up with the work being done in the creature people, they are an artifice, they’re all artificial,
department, so that the look of the city of Ha’Rar and the citizens of Ha’Rar match. so you’ve got to create the illusion that they’re
alive. Their aliveness comes from some of the
“This is probably the heaviest make, to create this world,” Roberts explains, “because everything mechanics in their heads, but a lot of it comes
has to look specifically non-Earthly, and it’s got to work for puppets, and it’s got to be lightweight, from the information you’re getting from the
and [it’s got to be] the right scale as well.” You certainly can’t have two-foot-high Podlings sitting on costumes, and the textures.”
human-sized furniture. And apart from the scale, each item of furniture used in the show needs to be
adapted to make room for the puppeteer, so “they’ll come apart, or have a hole underneath that’s Leterrier was new to the world of puppets
covered with a cushion,” Roberts explains. “It’s got to work for the puppeteers, otherwise it doesn’t when he came on board, as were the writers,
work, basically. But because we make everything, there’s always a way of cutting a hole in it.” but even the experienced puppeteers and
creature workshop designers were working
“The question has never been ‘can a puppet make you cry?’ The question is ‘can a puppet pick up at a level none of them had before. A fully
puppet-led live action drama series has simply
never been made before. Everyone knows that
puppets work brilliantly in comedy, but the big
question was: could they sustain a drama?
“I need to have real close-ups, extreme
close-ups of puppets emoting, crying, laughing,
falling in love,” Leterrier says. “That’s truth, and
it’s hard enough to capture with a real actor,
true emotion. With a puppet it’s impossible.
It’s just a sponge that in the morning is laying
in a box or on its stand, then two hours later
you’re like ‘now fall in love with this person’, or
‘the person you love the most has just died in
your arms’.” Leterrier admits that he was tough
on his puppeteers, pushing them to go further
than they were used to. “My challenge was
working with puppets, but their challenge was
working with Louis Leterrier,” he chuckles. “I was
non-compromising, ‘this will not look like your
grandfather’s puppet show, and this will look like
022 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
Many more Gelfling characters had to be THE CHALLENGE
created for the film, but expect to see some OF PUPPETS
old favourites as the Skeksis return. Brian
Froud was on hand to advise and help When it comes to filming with
create some brand new heroes and villains. puppets, and especially with pu
of different scales, the sets need to be
flexible. Each set needs to have lower
rostrums, or platforms, built into them
at different heights in order to allow
the puppeteers to be able to operate
while hidden in a trench.
“The Skeksis, who are five foot,
need a two-foot rostrum, because
of the way [the puppeteers] stand
inside [the puppets],” explains Gavin
Boquet, the production designer.
“But the Gelfling need a four-foot
rostrum.” So each set is built four
foot off the ground as standard,
with sections and levels of the set
then being removable via a system
of “squashed hexagons on wheels,
which meant Louis [Leterrier] could
quickly move them apart.”
The top level of the set – the bit
visible on camera – also needs to be
strong enough for people to walk on,
and so lower rostrum levels aren’t
needed. So if you take all of that into
consideration, and the fact that many
sets are occupied by both Gelfling
and Skeksis, and then if you throw
the even-smaller Podlings into the
equation – well, you can imagine the
headache it’s given the set designers.
COVER FEATURE
The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance
024 |
THE DARK CRYSTAL: AGE OF RESISTANCE
You Absolute Muppet
The Dark Crystal, that broke the mould then, so designs, they’re such fun, they’re so clear in who they are and what they want that really they’re so
let’s break it again and bring puppetry as far fun to write for.”
as it can get’, and that’s really what we did. We
were each other’s best friend and worst enemy. The writing, design and puppeteering was crucial to the characterisation, but the final piece of the
I saw the puppets every morning and was like puzzle was the voice actors – and Age Of Resistance has put together one of the starriest voice casts
‘argh, puppets’ and they were like ‘argh, Louis’.” in recent memory. Taron Egerton, Anya Taylor-Joy and Nathalie Emmanuel play Rian, Brea and Deet,
the three Gelfling who stumble across the dark secret behind the Skeksis’ power, and the rest of the
He cites Jim Henson, “the greatest puppeteer, cast includes such big names as Helena Bonham Carter, Jason Isaacs, Alicia Vikander, Sigourney
but also the greatest innovator,” as his Weaver, Mark Hamill, Mark Strong, Simon Pegg and Andy Samberg. Rather than in animation,
inspiration to push Age Of Resistance to be as where the voice work is recorded ahead of the animation, here the voices are slotted in after filming.
good as possible. “In every scene at least I want
to do something that has never been done with Nathalie Emmanuel tells us that posed a unique challenge, “because the puppeteer has dictated
a puppet. I was coming up with some ideas and most of the performance and how the character expresses itself, they’re the heart of that, really. The
concepts, doodles for how the puppets could job of the voice actor is to apply your performance to what they’ve already done, which is really
do these things. I want to see a puppet swim, I challenging, especially when everyone has their own way of speaking, different accents and those
want to see a puppet crashing through water, accents can affect how fast you speak.” Getting her voice to sync up with Deet’s mouth was an often
I want to see it run, I want to see it jump!” And frustrating challenge.
he succeeded – we got a sneak peek at a team
of puppeteers surrounding a puppet suspended Emmanuel didn’t get a chance to visit the set and ‘meet’ Deet, nor did she get to speak to Deet’s
on a rig, moving his arms and legs to simulate puppeteer Beccy Henderson ahead of performing Deet’s voice, something which she tells us she
breaststroke while a giant fan gave the puppet’s regrets, but adds that watching Henderson’s performance told her everything she needed to know
hair and costume the appearance of moving about Deet, who she calls “the loveliest, sweetest Gelfling you’ll ever meet”. She explains that she took
through water. Trust us, you’ve never put as her cues from the tone of the writing, and the style of Leterrier’s directing. “I think the performances
much thought into how your limbs move when of the puppets, and then the actors, were very modern and very naturalistic, in a way. Often with
you swim as these puppeteers have. puppets it can feel a little pantomimey, you know…? I think they’ve done a really good job of staying
true to the original piece but also evolving it to a much more modern pace.”
There are inevitable hard limitations when
it comes to working with puppets, but Leterrier The creature workshop team were keen to keep the puppets as faithful to the original film as
was determined to find as many ways round possible, but modern technology does come into play, with CGI being used to augment the world of
them as possible, and wanted to make the series Thra and give it more scope than could ever be achieved simply with sets. Leterrier tells us that CGI is
feel dynamic and fast-paced, not terms that are also used on the puppets – but sparingly. “We just enhance the eyes, a quiver of the mouth, the eyes
generally associated with puppets. He operates fluttering a little bit, glossing over,” Leterrier says. “But it’s still the glass eye of the puppet, it’s still the
a Steadicam personally on set, and uses it to skin of the puppet, we move it just slightly, and that made a huge difference. The limits I set were that
maximise the movements of the puppets. “I it cannot be better than what you could do with an amazing animatronic puppet with lots of motors
was like ‘I know it’s hard for you guys, because and stuff.” But he’s quick to assure us that not everything you see on screen is CG – the vast majority
there’s three of you plus monitors plus cables, of the magic is down to great puppet design and talented puppeteering. “We had this genius
to run around, it’s exhausting, but let me run puppeteer [Alice Dinnean] who plays Brea, and Brea is 100% real,” Leterrier says “There’s nothing we
around you with the Steadicam’… let’s move the did to her. And you’ll see her performance is absolutely incredible. And she does it all by herself.”
stool, not the piano.” He says the end result was
“everybody was running around, everybody The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance wears its respect and nostalgia for the original film on its
sleeve, but it isn’t just fan service. The writers assure us that the TV show is for everyone, regardless
was exhausted and sweaty, but it made for of whether they loved the original film, or if they’ve just confused it with Labyrinth. But one area in
better and bigger movements.” which it will definitely echo the film is in terrifying a whole generation of kids. After all, as writer Will
All aspects of the show’s production were Matthews points out, “it’s not The Happy Crystal, it’s The Dark Crystal.”
challenged to think of it as being more than
‘a puppet show’ – even from the very The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance is released on Netflix on 30 August 2019.
early scripting stage, the show had to be
treated seriously. “When we looked at The amount of craft
the show we realised that we can’t just involved is staggering.
lean on the idea that this is a visually
interesting world or the whimsicality
or whatever – this has to be a
drama, and it has to work as a
drama,” Grillo-Marxuach says.
His co-writer Jeff Addiss
adds: “[W]hen you start you
completely disregard that
they are puppets and you say
‘what do these two people in
this room want?’ And we’ve
actually been very lucky when
we got on set and started
filming to discover that you
can have two people in a room
talking about their feelings and it
works.” The other key thing that the
writers learned early into filming is
that “the Skeksis play,” Addiss says.
“They just work, they’re such beautiful
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LIST FEATURE GONZO WAS
PERFORMED BY
Jim Henson MUPPETS LEGEND DAVE
GOELZ, WHO WILL BE
PERFORMING BAFFI IN
THE DARK CRYSTAL:
AGE OF RESISTANCE.
6 GONZO
THE MUPPETS
SciFiNow doesn’t, as a rule, cover talking animals, which is why most of the Muppets are absent from this list.
We do, however, love aliens, so let’s take a moment to appreciate Gonzo, the blue-furred, hook-nosed ‘whatever’,
who was revealed to be an alien in 1999’s Muppets From Space. He also made a pretty good Charles Dickens
in A Muppet’s Christmas Carol.
Nightmare factor
Are you kidding? It’s GONZO.
7THE FIREYS 8THE FRAGGLES 9HOGGLE
LABYRINTH FRAGGLE ROCK LABYRINTH
Seriously, what is it with Jim Henson and How could we pick just one of Fraggle Hoggle begins the film as a grumpy creature
puppets taking their eyes out? If there’s one Rock’s characters? It was a feel-good show before becoming a hero, and also has the
scene from Labyrinth that’s haunted Millennials that Henson hoped to use to feed anti-war distinction of being Labyrinth’s first creature.
more than any other, it’s the weird Fireys sentiments to kids. The Fraggles are also a At the time, Hoggle was the most complicated
dance sequence, in which Sarah stumbles good example of the Creature Shop’s ‘magic character the Creature Shop had ever
across some terrifying dancing creatures who triangle’ – by placing the eyes in just the right built. Four people were responsible just for
can disassemble their bodies at will and try to place over a protruding nose, it makes the controlling his face, while a fifth actress wore
do the same to hers. Yikes. eyes look as if they’re focusing. the suit, controlling his body.
NIGHTMARE FACTOR NIGHTMARE FACTOR NIGHTMARE FACTOR
His expressions are in uncanny valley territory.
This one stayed with us for years. The Gorgs were pretty scary, to be fair.
028 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
HUSTON’S JIM HENSON
PROSTHETICS
TOOK SEVEN The Best Jim Henson Creatures
HOURS TO APPLY,
AND FIVE HOURS 11VOGONS
TO REMOVE. THE HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE
TO THE GALAXY
Jim Henson and Douglas Adams had
discussed working together, so it was only
fitting that the Creature Shop provided the
film’s adaptations’s creatures. The Shop made
the Marvin the Paranoid Android costume, but
the Vogons are the real scene-stealers.
10 THE GRAND NIGHTMARE FACTOR 13SKEKSIS
HIGH WITCH THE DARK CRYSTAL
THE WITCHES We wouldn’t even mind if they read their
poetry to us. With their hulking figures and high-pitched
Casting Anjelica Huston as The Grand High cackles, the Skeksis haunted the dreams of
Witch in the Roald Dahl adaptation was 12 THE GHOST OF every young child who watched The Dark
enough to make the character scary, but the CHRISTMAS YET Crystal. The Skeksis puppets are huge, full-
Jim Henson Creature Shop went one step TO COME body creations that required six puppeteers
further when it created the real faces of the THE MUPPET CHRISTMAS CAROL – two operating it from inside, and four
film’s witches – and in the utterly nightmarish external puppeteers handling limbs and other
scene in which she, and the other witches, are The Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come doesn’t elements. The Skeksis also originally didn’t
all transformed into mice. The Creature Shop’s even seem like a puppet – just a tall guy in speak English, but instead spoke a made-up
half-transformed puppets are truly horrific. robes. Yet he brings with him such an air language. Test audiences hated it, though, so
of dread that it’s only in adulthood that you the Skeksis were dubbed into English.
realise what an effective puppet he is. It’s the
lack of a face that makes him really scary. NIGHTMARE FACTOR
NIGHTMARE FACTOR NIGHTMARE FACTOR Terrifying, but so OTT as to be a little funny.
The Roald Dahl scare factor is present BRING BACK THE GHOST OF CHRISTMAS
and correct. PRESENT, HE WAS LOVELY.
THE CREATURE 14 THE WILD
SHOP HAD TO FIGURE THINGS
OUT A WAY FOR THE WHERE THE WILD
THINGS ARE
MAJORITY OF THE
PUPPET’S WEIGHT TO The Creature Shop refined the
BE CARRIED ON THE designs for the Wild Things, then
PERFORMER’S HIPS. figured out how to build them as life-
sized puppets. They weighed around
150 pounds and were operated by
a single performer inside each suit.
Rather than giving them animatronic
heads, the Wild Things’ facial
expressions were added in CG. The
suits were so hot that performers
would occasionally pass out, but
the suit was too heavy to fall over
so it would take the crew a while to
notice. Quite how such cumbersome
creatures looked so energetic on
screen is frankly mind-blowing.
Nightmare factor
Cuddles please.
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BIG MOVIE
Crawl
030 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
CRAWL
Skin Of Your Teeth
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK TTIANEHLLVEELAXIRUASSWINOWDHNRIHTEHEYOAKYJRNOARUUOAC’RRNK,ELDCENRKAOAALWTYLAIRGLESAACTDOOYRDFEHOLOARMRIOE
WORDS JONATHAN HATFULL
INTERVIEWS JONATHAN HATFULL, POPPY-JAY PALMER
| 031
BIG MOVIE
Crawl
Everyone knows the structure of a that very straightforward survival story, was And if it was important for Aja to
home invasion horror. You’ve got an obvious choice right away. I couldn’t read remember why he wanted to hop into a
your happy(ish) family, your suburban the script right away but I kept fantasising water tank for 40 days, it was even more of
McMansion, and you’ve got the bad about this idea over the weekend and a few a challenge for Kaya Scodelario. The actor is
guys trying to get in and stalk them. days, and then I read the script but by that no stranger to physically challenging shoots,
Maybe it’s a break-in gone bad or time I already had the movie in my head.” but she tells us that Crawl was “really,
maybe it’s Purge Night. But when really tough. I’ve actually done quite a lot
your home invader is a colossal Aja burst onto the genre scene with his of underwater work,” she explains. “One of
alligator, the game has changed. nerve-rattling 2003 French horror High my early movies was called The Truth About
Tension (Switchblade Romance in the UK) Emanuel and I had to learn to scuba dive for
“I didn’t need to bring an agenda, like: and his gruelling 2006 remake of Wes that. On Pirates we did a lot of underwater
‘Oh, that mean one is going to get revenge!’” Craven’s The Hills Have Eyes. Since then, he stuff. It’s something that I have had to do
laughs Alexandre Aja. “No, they are here. tells us that he’s had fun hopping from genre before, but this was quite different just
There are five million-plus alligators in the to genre, experimenting with daft creature because of the amount of water.
wild in the southern part of the US. There are feature fun with Piranha (“Jaws gone wild”
attacks on people very often. It’s happening as he puts it), dark horror fable Horns and “We shot it in a warehouse, inside a giant
everywhere in the world, recently in Rio the baffling blend of Brian De Palma and tank,” she tells us. “It was kind of this huge
there was some flooding where the cops Guillermo del Toro that was The 9th Life Of swimming pool, and throughout the shoot
couldn’t go and get them, it happened also in Louis Drax (we can all agree to ignore his they’d fill the tank up with more water so
Queensland. With more flooding and more Mirrors remake, everybody gets one). But he
storms, with global warming, nature is kind explains that he’s always had a real craving S“OTI OMWEMATNAHTKINEEDG
of fighting back and getting in our way of to make another movie that really puts the REALLY SCARY”
living, and the creatures are also coming.” audience through the wringer.
ALEXANDRE AJA
That’s right, Crawl is pitching its heroine “I couldn’t find the right subject until
Haley Keller (The Maze Runner and Skins [Crawl] was sent to me and I was like ‘this is the level would rise day-by-day as though
alum Kaya Scodelario) against a hungry something that gives me the opportunity of it was in real time with the hurricane. We
alligator, all while a Category Five hurricane crafting a real roller coaster for the audience, started with having tap water around our
rages outside. Haley’s rushed home against that’s very serious and straightforward and ankles, and then by the end of the shoot
the advice of, well, everyone, to rescue her about survival with the very interesting we were swimming through the tank. The
dad (Barry Pepper). It’s bad enough trying to element that the home invasion is not with crew couldn’t touch the ground. We had
move her wounded father through a house a killer, [it’s] with a natural disaster and an floorboards coming up and furniture falling
that is rapidly flooding, but then in comes animal that lives in the neighbourhood. apart, and we’d have the director almost
the uninvited guest… drowning while trying to eat a hotdog. It was
“It’s always very important when you quite interesting, but also a lot of fun.”
“I remember two years ago receiving that fall in love with a subject,” he continues.
script from my co-producer on the movie “Because when you’re in the water for 40 You’d have thought that Aja would have
and reading the logline, and the logline was days with a wet suit on and a full crew and been extremely well-prepared for dealing
so simple, so straightforward, this survival you have rain and wind and the sound is 120 with water tank shoots given his Piranha
story about that young woman who had to decibels plus, it becomes a really difficult experience (well enough to co-ordinate his
go in, during a Category Five hurricane, place to be for everyone. So you have to lunch, at least), but the single location setting
and save her dad from that place full of remember why you’re there and you always and limited time frame presented more
alligators,” enthuses Aja. “That simple story, go back to that first moment!” challenges than you may expect. “Oh yeah,
from all the movies I’ve done this is maybe
There’s no way out for the most technical one because we had to
the Keller family. build seven or eight tanks, each of them was
gigantic to be able to be a full part of the set.
The tanks were supposed to be able to resist
water rising to the top with filtration and
wind and rain and so many visual effects.
It was a really technical movie. At the end
[it] became almost like a gut experience. My
feeling is when you watch Crawl you really
go through a survival experience and it’s not
about all the technical things that we had
to face, it’s about: can you make it to the
end of the day? And every time you try to do
something, something dreadful is happening
and makes it even more difficult to achieve.
It’s about, can you push the boundaries, the
human boundaries, to the limit of becoming
that predator yourself?”
Speaking of that predator, one distinction
that Aja wants to make clear is that Crawl
032 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK CRAWL
Skin Of Your Teeth
ANIMAL ATTACK
REPOTRT
Mother nature is not always kind…
AMITY, LONG ISLAND
WHEN: 4 July 1975
WHAT: Great white shark
REPORTING OFFICER: Chief Brody
INCIDENT SUMMARY: Despite my
multiple attempts to warn Mayor Vaughn
about the danger of opening the beach, there were indeed
multiple attacks on visiting bathers by what our expert, Hooper,
assures me was a Great White. There were multiple fatalities,
and frankly the fact that it fell to me, Hooper and Quint (now
deceased) to take a boat out and blow the damn thing up
ourselves is an absolute disgrace. This is a categorical failure
of local government.
AQUATICA, PACIFIC OCEAN
WHEN: 26 July 1999
WHAT: Three genetically enhanced
mako sharks
REPORTING WITNESS: Shark wrangler
Carter Blake
INCIDENT SUMMARY: Well, what more can I say? That
Dr Susan McAlester broke the Harvard compact and has
increased the size of these sharks’ brains in some unhinged
attempt to cure Alzheimer’s, creating killing machines that
are faster, smarter, deadlier in the process? That they ate their
way through the entire crew, with the exception of myself and
Preach, and sunk a very expensive ocean research facility?
Gliding monsters is right.
CHICAGO
WHEN: 14 November 1981
WHAT: A big old mutated alligator
REPORTING OFFICER: David Madison
INCIDENT SUMMARY: Look, I know I have
a bit of a reputation around here but it
would have been really nice if someone had actually listened
to me before all those unlucky people got eaten by a giant
freakin’ alligator, okay! A lot of very fancy people ended up
as dinner for that thing… also, we are going to need a new
mayor… But look, the real problem here is that if we keep
letting kids flush baby alligators down toilets, this is just going
to keep happening.
BALUASCTKRWALAIATER, NORTHERN
WHEN: 24 April 2008
WHAT: An enormous crocodile
REPORTING WITNESS: Lee
INCIDENT SUMMARY: I know that you’re
supposed to follow the tourist trails, but our guide seemed
really confident that he knew a spot where we would get some
really good fishing in. We thought he knew what he was
doing. You don’t know what you’re capable of until the only
person who knows the way out of the mangroves is dead and
it’s just you and your family trying to get away from a crocodile
who won’t bloody die.
LOST RIVER LAKE, TEXAS
WHEN: 3 August 1978
WHAT: A swarm of mutant piranha
REPORTING OFFICER: Maggie McKeown
INCIDENT SUMMARY: Once again, a
categorical failure of local government to
shut down an area containing aggressive wildlife. I will admit
it took me a moment or two to believe that someone really
had genetically engineered a strain of piranha for use in the
Vietnam war, but once you see what those things can do, you
put your higher brain to one side and you figure out how to
stop the little killing machines.
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BIG MOVIE
Crawl
is not a movie about a giant monster, So for me it was an obvious choice from with the teeth, what will keep them in their
something that has crawled up out of the the beginning that I wanted to have full CG seats is the quality of the lead performance.
bayou, never before seen by human eyes. creatures but interaction with the water.” It doesn’t matter how impressive your CGI
No, nature’s oldest killing machine is plenty is if we’re not invested, and Aja tells us that
scary enough already. “I didn’t want to make This meant that some leaps of the he knew Scodelario would be the perfect fit
a monster movie,” he explains. “I wanted imagination were required from Scodelario. for this role. “In the end it’s not about the
to make something really, really scary but I The water and wind may have been there, quality of the CGI or the set or the storm,
didn’t want to make a monster movie. I didn’t but there was something very different in it’s all about the actors and I knew that
want to create giant alligators that would place of the killer gator. “Yeah, we had three everything was about who is going to play
not be believable. I wanted the story to be in stages: we had nothing there, where I was [Haley] and who is going to be able to carry
the realm of possibilities. There is a realistic just screaming into the abyss; then we had the movie on her shoulders,” he explains.
way to create them and I wanted to bring “I’ve been a fan of Kaya since Skins. She
that hyperreal feeling. If you look online, “SIG’HMIRE’LNSFORAIEOKNNIDCE.K’..S- was an interesting choice because she had
you can see hours of alligator or crocodile ASS CHICK” that kind of determination and the look that
footage. Most of them will be boring because even in the darkness, doesn’t give up. She
it’s just sitting in the sun and not moving KAYA SCODELARIO incarnates that kind of fight and resistance,
but some of them are just the most scary, and she’s also very physical when it comes
dreadful attacks, vicious movements and you what was essentially a green pillow on sticks; to fighting alligators! She’s really good in the
understand why this creature [has] barely and then we had a lovely Serbian gentleman movie. And knowing what she went through
changed for the last 16 million years. They who, bless his heart, would wear a skin-tight making it, because we were in the middle of
are efficient in their design, they are like bright green lycra head-to-toe suit, and I it with all the wind, storm, rain water all the
killing machines, they are very territorial would scream at him,” she remembers. “He time...Without her I would never have been
and I didn’t need anything else.” was sweet but the outfit left nothing to the able to make it.”
imagination. I was essentially screaming at
However, going as real as possible actually the Serbian guy most of the time.” “I’d look for movies that had strong women
meant that creating a CG alligator was in the centre, and when this project came
the only option. “I couldn’t find a way to While the immediate draw for a lot of about I started talking to the producers about
do animatronics that would re-create the monster movie fans will be the angry animal it and then the director, and had a discussion
accurate movement of these alligators,” the about [how we could be inspired by other
director explains. “And today when you look women] in this genre,” explains Scodelario.
at what you can do in CGI, it’s spectacular. “Sarah Connor is my hero. She’s the most
Kaya Scodelario was WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
excited to carry a film.
034 |
CRAWL
Skin Of Your Teeth
SAM THE MAN iconic character from my childhood, and there. I think that was really realistic.”
I have always been looking for something What’s more, Aja and Scodelario are both
Alexandre Aja tells us similar to that. Obviously this character is
why his collaboration slightly different but it was my opportunity keenly aware that this is an increasingly
with Sam Raimi was a to tell this girl’s story. It’s probably one of the rare opportunity to connect with big screen
long time coming most feminist scripts I’ve read. I’m no one’s audiences. This is exactly the kind of film
girlfriend, I’m not in my underwear for no you want to experience with a crowd in the
The term ‘master of horror’ gets thrown reason, there’s no fucking love interest, it’s dark, fully aware of an entire auditorium
around a lot, but there really are few just a young woman in a situation, fighting holding their breath.
filmmakers more deserving than the great for her life. That spoke to me. The fact that
Sam Raimi. Sure, he may have moved away there’s a whole other element to it – it’s “It’s kind of fun to be a part of something
from the genre, but the man gave us The Evil something that I’ve never done before and that I know will come across in the movie
Dead trilogy after all, and with his Ghost have a huge appreciation for Alexandre, he theatre,” Scodelario enthuses. “It’s part of
House production company he’s kept us is an icon because he does this so well. It’s the cinema experience that is kind of dying
supplied with a steady stream of scary movies something he’s very good at and something out now.”
since 2004. He’s also had his eye on Aja for that people love to see.
some time, as the director explains… “I have to say it’s never been such an
“I wanted the opportunity to headline exciting time to make this kind of movie,”
“He is a legend for me, period. He is my own studio movie,” she continues. “It’s adds Aja. “In this time where everything is
one of the reasons why I’m making this so rare for women, it’s so difficult for us to changing with the streaming platforms and
movie,” Aja enthuses. “After High Tension be the front and centre of a film and to not everything, at the end of the day the only
when I moved to the US, we had the choice have a leading guy who would be paid more movies that can challenge gigantic movies
between making the movie with Wes Craven, than you or have a lot more creative control. like The Avengers are scary movies. And
The Hills Have Eyes, or making a movie This was an opportunity for me to start there is a reason for that, it’s because they’re
produced by Sam Raimi that ended up being something and finish it by myself. I wanted offering an experience. They’re offering the
The Messengers. And it was a really tough that challenge. I love being on set all day. same kind of physical experience that the
choice at the time because choosing between Also, as a mother now, I want to [do my part] big blockbusters are doing as well, even with
Wes Craven and Sam Raimi for a young and inspire my family, and inspire the next a different type of budget. And people are
filmmaker, it was like ‘oh I have the two best generation with this character. She’s a kick- so into them now and it’s so great to share
producers I could dream about!’ And finally ass chick. I like that she’s sarcastic and I like with the audience your love and your passion
we went with The Hills Have Eyes and I wrote that she’s angry, but can still have a kind of for that type of cinema that I really want to
a note to Sam saying that I hope one day we beautiful reunion and still have the tension keep going.”
will find a way to work together. It took a few
years but here we are. And after all those Crawl is released on 23 August.
years of waiting.
| 035
“Sam is an unbelievable human being and
also one of the most talented filmmakers. And
when it comes to producing a movie that’s
so difficult to make, to have someone who
always has an idea, an answer, an instinct to
help you with respecting your vision, that’s all
I wish for any filmmaker.”
Danger inside and out
as the water rises...
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
JHNTOTCJAOAVAEOU,MLERRKTBSOIHR4AMTOIIIAONNLLO’OL2B’EGSSRRNIAIHESINNEG…NOHNGIGDWWETHIATVORITSTDAUMHIFTMNNOIAINTPGNR.UIDRIWEGSTEROHHE JOE HILL’S NOS4A2 isn’t exactly shy young woman from a troubled home, Vic
about its big horror hook. A 135-year- is a tough but vulnerable person who finds
WORDS JONATHAN HATFULL old man named Charlie Manx roams herself in Charlie Manx’s crosshairs when
the hidden highways of America in his she finds one of these impossible passages
036 | vintage Wraith with its none-too-subtle in a long-demolished bridge that can take
licence plate, abducting children and her wherever she needs to go. In that very
feeding on their energy as he whisks them particular Joe Hill way, the story delivers
away to a terrifying magical realm called truly nightmarish genre chills and a gritty
Christmasland, turning them into monsters real-world story with a flawed hero. It was
who’ll be forever young. the latter which made the book such an
enticing proposition for Jami O’Brien, the
But at the heart of the novel is the showrunner on AMC’s TV adaptation.
very human character of Vic McQueen. A
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
“Absolutely, the McQueens,” she enthuses. fascinating and also really honest.” small screen was exactly as complicated as
“I remember just reading about the McQueen As fans of the book will tell you, Hill you’d expect.
family and I thought that they were drawn
with such honesty and nuance, you don’t see performs a dazzling high-wire act combining “Yes, it was tricky!” she laughs. “We kind
that on TV very often. I think Vic herself is the big fantastical swings with such a of took our cue from the book because one
a really phenomenal character and I think grounded family story. On the one hand, of the things that I think is really wonderful
the relationship with her parents is really you’ve got this Christmas-obsessed monster about it is that it is, at times, really scary,
fascinating. That, and of course the whole in his vampiric automobile who’s constantly sometimes it’s really funny, and at the
crazy world of it! In addition to the really shifting ages and on the other you have centre of it there is this family drama with
brutally honest family there’s also a place a heroine who is dealing with a horribly Vic McQueen at first with her parents and
called Christmasland, and a 135-year-old relatable everyday life living under the later she kind of creates her own family. So I
man! So I just thought that the world was shadow of addiction and domestic violence, thought that it was important to try to keep
and O’Brien tells us that bringing that to the all of those elements in the show because I
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BIG MOVIE
NOS4A2
think that that mixed tone was part of what I in flashback, do we throw out this part of Vic McQueen is a
liked about the book as well.” the story?’. And the truth is I didn’t really fascinating heroine.
want to do any of those things because I
Helping O’Brien and the writers in that was so interested in that part of the story.
task is director Kari Skogland, a veteran of Vic grappling with her parents and who
shows like The Handmaid’s Tale and Penny they are and where she sits in the world, Vic
Dreadful (and recently announced as the encountering her bridge for the first time and
director of Marvel’s Falcon & Winter Soldier Vic encountering Charlie Manx for the first
series) who was tasked with setting the tone time, which all happens in the book when
in the first two episodes. “I came to her and she’s very young, I thought that they were so
I said: ‘I think that the answer is that Vic is fundamental to who she is as a character. I
kind of the anchor or the pivot point between wanted to make sure that our Vic, meaning
these two different worlds, the real world the actor who is going to take us through the
and the supernatural world, and her bridge series, was the actor who took us through
is kind of a bridge between them’,” explains that portion of the book. So I made the
O’Brien. “So I felt like she was the key; we decision to just age Vic up a little bit.”
stay focused on her and then we kind of
ground the supernatural in the real world. O’Brien settled on up-and-coming
And so Kari brought in ideas about how to Australian actor Ashleigh Cummings, who
do that, one that comes to mind immediately impressed in 2016’s gruelling Hounds Of
is that she said she never wanted to see the Love and who immediately convinces in this
bridge appear or disappear. It’s either there crucial role. “I got very lucky with Ashleigh
or it’s not there and that way when we see it, Cummings,” smiles O’Brien. “Vic McQueen
it feels like a real bridge and when we don’t in the novel, she’s one of my favourite
see it, we don’t see it. But there’s never a fictional characters of all time. She’s a
kind of science fiction-y vibe to it!” regular kid, but what she has going for her
is courage in spades and over the course of
Of course, the other key element is casting. the first season she learns to harness it. The
In the book, we meet Vic at age eight before thing that was tricky was that eventually
following her into adulthood, but O’Brien this kid needs to have the grit to go toe-to-
tells us that the only way to make the show toe with Charlie Manx, in our case played
work was to bring the character into her by Zachary Quinto who is obviously a very
teens. “You say to yourself ‘do we cast a powerful actor. At the same time, when
child actor, do we play this part of the story
038 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
NOS4A2
Riders On The Storm
“THE MORE he would consider it, and thank goodness character is, and to the fact that O’Brien and
DISTURBING that he did because I can’t really imagine the team working on the show have not shied
SCENES ARE anybody else in the role. He is so specific away from the darker aspects of Hill’s novel.
IMPORTANT” and focused, he created a whole different The author isn’t exactly known for pulling
physicality and voice for every age of Charlie his punches and this novel in particular
JAMI O’BRIEN Manx, he’s just great in the part. He is funny, features some truly shocking moments of
he is ferocious and just laser focused and violent horror. We had to wonder if there
we meet her she is kind of uncertain about super, super fun to watch.” were any qualms about featuring them in the
where she is in the world, she’s having series but O’Brien tells us that she had no
troubles with her home life, she has a kind When he’s freshly fed, Charlie Manx intention of watering anything down.
of internalised sense of class inferiority appears as a handsome, dapper young man.
and there’s a real vulnerability to her. So When he’s hungry, he ages rapidly into a “There are some really disturbing scenes
capturing that vulnerability with seeds of hunched, skeletal figure, all wispy hair, in the show that are pulled from the book
badassness was the task. Ashleigh kind of sagging skin and yellowing teeth. Although and there were a lot of conversations that
blew us away in somehow being able to his approach is vampiric in a sense, O’Brien we had with the network about them,” she
encapsulate both those things at once.” tells us that she was determined to avoid remembers. “About how to portray them,
going the cape and fangs route. “What we whether or not we were being responsible,
And speaking of Zachary Quinto, anyone took away from the book was, again, heading because we never wanted to be salacious for
who saw the Star Trek actor show off his towards a real world place,” she explains. salaciousness’ sake, but I think that some
murder basement in American Horror Story “Charlie Manx is a man, he’s not a monster. of the more disturbing scenes are actually
knows just how menacing he’s capable of He is monstrous but he was an actual human very important to character and I think that
being and he is on superb form here. But being who lived on earth, who was born, and they were in the book for a reason and so I
Charlie Manx is a unique challenge for any was born in the 19th century, so in the older felt like we needed to have them. AMC, to its
actor, not to mention a casting department. look he may look monstrous but that’s partly credit, want to talk through stuff like that
“In the course of the show we see Charlie because nobody is 100 years old. He may to make sure that it’s being responsible but
Manx in his 30s and we see him over 100 have bad teeth but his bad teeth are because after we talked it through it was on board
years old, and our first question was: how old they didn’t have good dentistry back in 1890! and supportive. I think that some of the more
of a gentleman do you cast?” O’Brien laughs. So we tried to start with him as a human disturbing elements of the book which we
“Initially we were talking about some kind being and then think about what the aging have put on the show are some of the more
of elder statesman to play the role and once process would look like on a real person. The complicated, interesting moments of the
we decided we were looking for somebody more extreme looks just come from: nobody’s show so I’m glad that it was up for it!”
in his 30s or early 40s, we found out that really that old!”
Zach was available. I’m just such a huge fan NOS4A2 begins at 9pm on 13 August on
of his I just started praying every night that We’ve seen the first few episodes and AMC Global.
can definitely attest to just how creepy the
MAP TO THE Zachary Quinto as the
SHARED UNIVERSE vampiric Charlie Manx.
PENNYWISE LIVES?
There’s a great moment in the novel NOS4A2
in which we get a glimpse at Charlie Manx’s
roadmap. Titled ‘Map To The United Instates Of
America’, it’s the infernal monster’s guide to the
hidden highways and shorter ways including,
of course, directions to Christmasland. What
makes it exciting is the fact that the map
contains directions to the Lovecraft Keyhole,
the location of Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez’s
glorious comic Locke And Key, the Treehouse
Of The Mind, from Hill’s novel Horns, and the
Pennywise Circus in Derry, Maine.
Hill and Stephen King have a history of
dropping Easter Eggs and references to each
other’s work and it’s delightful to see that
preserved in the show. And while we shouldn’t
expect to see IT’s dancing clown drop in to
menace Vic McQueen any time soon, it is a
reminder that we’re finally going to get to see
that Locke & Key TV series before too long.
And, perhaps the most important thing is that
it’s fun. When we talked to Hill about the book
when it was published in 2014, he rebuffed
our query about a shared universe with “Nah,
mostly I’m just goofin’. I try not to take my own
stuff too seriously. In a way it kind of all takes
place in the same universe. But in Horns there’s
a moment when there’s a party going on and
Duke Hammer is playing on the boombox, and
that’s the band from Heart Shaped Box. But it’s
kind of like, just me foolin’.”
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CULT CINEMA
Memory: The Origins Of Alien
SOOPRFEI CTGHI IENES
ALEXANDRE O PHILIPPE’S NEW DOCUMENTARY,
MEMORY, TAKES US TO UNEXPLORED DEPTHS
OF RIDLEY SCOTT’S ALIEN…
WORDS JONATHAN HATFULL
Y FIRST MEMORY OF ALIEN, crucial. “To be able to meet Diane O’Bannon © Courtesy of the O’Bannon Estate Dan O’Bannon was
which kind of haunted me for and open her archives and stuff that as a fan a force of nature.
years, was actually the poster,” of Alien you had heard about but never seen…
filmmaker Alexandre O Philippe it was really special,” he enthuses. “She had © Courtesy of the O’Bannon Estate
tells us. “It’s this absolutely all these boxes open in her living room, there
perfect combination that makes you really want were like eight boxes filled with sketches, self-
to see it and also gives you the sense of dread. If portraits, storyboards and alternate endings
I watch it, what’s going to happen? Is it going to and everything you can imagine. It took a little
mess with my brain?” bit of convincing, but I think she sensed very
The answer to that question is clearly: yes. quickly that our heart was in the right place and
For 40 years, Ridley Scott’s nightmare has she basically just said: ‘Have it. Let’s do this.’
terrified and fascinated audiences, and now And that’s why we give her a credit as executive
Philippe, who previously tackled Night Of The producer, without her we wouldn’t have a film,
Living Dead in Doc Of The Dead and Psycho no question.”
with 78/52, has turned his keen eye and love of
interpretation to its history and subtext. However, the filmmaker is also keenly
“Initially the film was going to be focused interested in pushing further to explore the
on the chest-burster scene,” he remembers. mythological and artistic inspirations, from
“I was interested to see if I could explore it Bacon to ancient Egypt. The film has a host of
in a similar way that I dealt with the shower expert voices, from the production team and
scene in Psycho, but very quickly realised that cast to film critics and scholars, each of whom
they’re very different beasts and it would have has their own take on what Alien means.
been a mistake. When I started exploring the
mythological underpinnings of the film I realised “Great movies are just as much the product
that there was really something there. And it of the unconscious as they are the product of
was really the story of Ridley Scott showing conscious craft, and when that happens you get
the triptych by Francis Bacon to HR Giger and something like Alien and then here we are 40
realising that this particular triptych had been years later and we’re still uncovering layers of
hijacked by the Furies. I thought: ‘This is really meaning,” he enthuses. “You look at a piece like
interesting, I want to go down that particular Alien and it’s a film that went completely against
rabbit hole and see where it takes me,’ and the trends and is essentially a male rape movie
the moment that I did I think everything started in space.
opening up in new ways.”
As you might expect given the title, Philippe “It’s not fully conscious, clearly the people
puts a welcome focus on writer Dan O’Bannon’s who were working on this film were not fully
life and career, and how this unique, eccentric conscious of what they were working on. I don’t
individual came to conceive of one of the think it’s possible, I mean quite frankly if they
greatest genre movies ever made. O’Bannon’s had been conscious of it, I don’t think the movie
widow Diane is a key presence in the film and would have been greenlit in the first place!”
Philippe tells us that her participation was
While it’s great to see the likes of Tom Skerritt
and Veronica Cartwright chatting about their
experiences, Philippe tells us that he was much
more nervous about finding the right academic
040 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
MEMORY
Origin Of The Species
Tom Skerritt still interviewees. “Finding those experts and those
treasures the film. scholars, and to interview them and edit them
in a way that was not going to come across as
There’s a wealth of pontification or as too academic and it would
archive material. still have a dramatic and entertaining flow, that
was the main concern,” he explains. “Because
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK those are big ideas. There are a lot of huge
ideas in Memory, and so to make those ideas
digestible and accessible and entertaining to
an audience, that was my main challenge but
luckily I think we found the right people for
that too.”
It should be noted that there’s plenty of
fascinating material focusing on the production
history, including a great breakdown of the
chest-burster sequence and a really quite
touching look at O’Bannon’s campaign to
secure the services of the great HR Giger. “And
the fact that Ridley said ‘absolutely!’” marvels
Philippe. “He could have looked at it and said:
‘No, I don’t want to go in that direction at all to
explore what’s lurking under the surface. And
then you have a completely different film. So,
what was it that made Ridley say yes? He was
clearly the right director for this project, he was
in tune with it.”
The result is a fascinating treasure trove
that will send you scurrying off to dig out your
Blu-ray. While reeling off some of our favourite
readings from the film that were new to us, we
asked Philippe if there was anything specific that
surprised him.
“Oh sure, you name it,” he laughs. “The ties
to Egyptian mythology was something I was
not really aware of, there’s so many things.
Making a film like this has to be a process of
discovery and you have to kind of get into it like
a newborn in a way because you have to keep
the excitement about this film that you’ve seen a
gazillion times.
“But I fully believe that when you talk about
these great movies to people who obviously
have a tremendous knowledge about them and
a very specific point of view, you inevitably start
seeing it in a different way and there’s no limit
to that. I could talk to a million people, a million
filmmakers, a million artists about the Psycho
shower scene and every time I would look at in
a different way. And the same thing with Alien,
because we all bring something to it.”
Memory: The Origins Of Alien is in cinemas 30
August and DVD and on demand 2 September.
| 041
BIG MOVIE WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark
LEGEND HAS IT
Bad things are lurking in the big screen
adaptation of Alvin Schwartz’s children’s
horror anthology book series, Scary Stories
To Tell In The Dark. We talk to director
André Øvredal to find out more…
WORDS POPPY-JAY PALMER
IN THE AGE OF ANTHOLOGIES, this year’s big summer horror
comes in the form of Lionsgate’s Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark,
based on Alvin Schwartz’s short story book collection of the same
name. Trollhunter and The Autopsy Of Jane Doe director André Øvredal
is helming the project, which follows a group of teenagers from the
small town of Mill Valley as they come across a book hidden in a
mansion. Little do they know, the book as written by a young girl called
Sarah with horrible secrets who turned the true events of her tortured
life into a book of scary stories, which begin to come real for the kids.
With Trollhunter’s blend of horror, adventure and comedy and Jane
Doe’s deliciously creepy chills, Øvredal’s genre cred is beyond reproach.
“I grew up as a child of the VHS generation,” he tells us. “It’s been my
favourite genre as I’ve grown up, I was watching all kinds of horror.”
Raised in Norway, horror films were sometimes hard to come by for
Øvredal. With strict film guidelines in place, many of his favourites
were banned in his home country, so his family would sometimes
obtain horror films on the sly during visits to England. “Evil Dead, I
think, was illegal in Norway,” he says, "and I remember [my family got
me a copy] and it was the highlight of my life at that time.”
Jane Doe received critical praise upon its release, but the director is
trying something new with Scary Stories. "Jane Doe is a minimalist
film, and Scary Stories is, in some ways, a maximalist film,” he
explains. “It’s got a specific time period, it’s got an epic tone, it’s a
journey for these characters on a whole different level. So it’s been a
great experience to be able to broaden out from minimalism to making
something with a much broader scope, but still keep it a horror movie.”
However, some of Øvredal’s previous horror’s influence leaks into
Scary Stories, namely the way in which he constructs suspense. “I like
to keep people guessing or waiting,” he says. “I love anticipation. I
think it’s sometimes more fun than the actual scare. I love playing with
the camera and editing and pacing and music. I think it will show up, I
think you’ll be able to tell that it’s the same director behind Jane Doe.”
With Scary Stories being aimed at a slightly younger audience
than most horror films, Øvredal wanted to keep the focus more on
the suspenseful side of the genre and less on the grotesque. “I think
the movie will be perceived as scary — it definitely has been at test
screenings — so I don’t think it’s tougher being PG-13,” he explains. “A
lot of great horror movies have been PG-13. I think Poltergeist was PG in
its day. So I think it’s tone… The film doesn’t have an evil tone. We’re
not out to torture the audience. We’re out to give them a fun time.”
With a cast made up mostly of teenagers and young adults, many of
the film’s stars are unknowns, and actors with only a handful of film
credits to their names. Zoe Colletti leads the cast as Stella Nicholls, the
girl who finds the book of Scary Stories.
“Some [of the actors] have quite a bit of experience, and others have
less, but they’ve all been chosen for their personality, for what they
042 |
SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK
Legend Has It
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK | 043
BIG MOVIE
Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark
“I have a realist approach and Guillermo del Toro has a fantastical approach,
I think there is a very interesting balance between those two elements and
that we’ve created something unique”
André Øvredal
bring to the characters,” Øvredal tells us. and then suddenly they presented me with finishing up the movie, in a way I’m a part of
They really helped me shape the characters a screenplay with 1968 as the time period. Guillermo’s monster universe. That’s quite an
into who they are. They’re so natural and We had amazing production designers and unbelievable thing to be.”
giving to work – they seem to have a lot of costume designers, and people who really
faith, sometimes I’m shocked at how much know this era, and it was so much fun to During production, del Toro was always
faith they have after I’ve given extremely go into this and create it. Even seeing how fighting in Øvredal’s corner. “He’s so warm
precise direction. I think there are some things repeat themselves, like the costumes, and so welcoming and so giving, and he was
definite star potential in several of these seeing what was modern then compared to so protective of the way I wanted to make the
actors. To me, they’re amazing, which is what’s modern now, it’s fascinating, how movie. Even J Miles Dale and Sean Daniel,
something that is consistently there. [They everything goes in circles.” who have done a tonne of big, wonderful,
listen to feedback] and their performances classic movies, really protected Scary Stories
are so great. So I think the audience will see One of Scary Stories’ biggest pulls is the throughout the process to make sure that I
a lot from them, especially from Zoe Colletti, fact that the brilliant Guillermo del Toro has had every resource that they could possibly
the lead. She’s an amazing actress, and we been on board from the start. The filmmaker give me. It’s been amazing. Especially
will see a lot of her, that’s for sure.” developed the story with Patrick Melton Guillermo, who knows what kind of support
and Marcus Dunstan, and has stayed on a director actually needs… He made sure
Scary Stories kicks off in 1968 in America, to produce alongside Sean Daniel, Jason F that I would never be stepped on by anybody.
during a tense era in the world. With wars, Brown, Elizabeth Grave and his The Shape He told me: ‘This is your movie and you will
revolutions, assassinations and loads of other Of Water colleague J Miles Dale. It sounds as do the movie you want, and I’ll just be there
dramatic events happening all around the though GDT was a selling point for Øvredal to support you.’ He really did that, the whole
globe, people were living on edge. too, who hadn’t even heard of the Scary time. He gave me a tonne of creative advice,
Stories book series before the script for the and he basically said you can take it or leave
“There was general turbulence with things film landed on his desk. it. But, you know, this is my story. He’s been
that were going on in the background of our extremely helpful with everything from the
lives,” says the director. “That kind of feeling “Guillermo’s involvement was an amazing effects and the creatures to the design, all
of not working in a society where everything thing, to be able to work with maybe the that stuff has been an amazing collaboration.
is under control. I thought it would be greatest living director at the moment and And walking into it, it was a great thing to
a fascinating thing to play with. I never definitely of our generation, to be able to be have a person who was in a way a mentor
thought in my life that I would make a period part of his monster universe,” says Øvredal. to me.”
movie, that wasn’t a particular thing for me, “I was thinking about that while we were
044 | WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK
SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK
Legend Has It
Though Øvredal was commanding the first time he fell in love with it instantly. “I SCARIEST STORIES
ship, he admits that del Toro’s influence is would never direct a movie without loving
clear throughout the film. “From the script the screenplay,” he tells us. As soon as he All three volumes of Alvin
to the designs of the creatures, there’s so finished it, he was struck with a feeling that Schwartz’s Scary Stories To Tell
many elements of him in this for sure, and he could really make the film his own. In The Dark drew from folklore
I think people will be able to recognise and urban legends and wove
them. I do believe an interesting thing is “That’s such a great feeling because it’s so them into an anthology series that
that I have a realist approach and he has a hard to find scripts that you just instantly, is guaranteed to give even the
fantastical approach, and I think there is a emotionally and professionally connect pluckiest of children nightmares.
very interesting balance between those two with,” he continues. “I understood the Here are some of the best…
elements, and that we’ve created something kids, I understood the tone, I understood
hopefully unique.” everything. I have my own version of it, THE BABYSITTER
obviously, but I was desperate to make it as
Del Toro has been deeply involved soon as I read it. I was so happy knowing A young woman receives a phone
throughout, says Øvredal, especially during that Guillermo [and the producers] also liked call while babysitting one night.
the editing process. The pair worked closely me and Jane Doe. I felt really protected. “Check the children,” says a voice.
with a whole team of studio producers, There’s been a team of people around me, She shakes off the call and watches
figuring out the tempo of the film and and I’ve been supported for the entire TV instead. The phone rings several
realising the horror film that Øvredal wanted process. It’s my first kind of Hollywood more times, each time with the
to create. “Nobody knows as much about movie and we’ve all heard the horror stories same message, and each time the
filmmaking as Guillermo,” says Øvredal. of how badly they can go, but I really felt to babysitter hangs up. Annoyed,
“I’ve been working with him for the best part welcome by all these people. They believed she finally informs the police, who
of a year, and I definitely think I’ve come out in my vision of it. That’s been a big part of decide to trace the next call. After
the other side a better director.” the reason I dared to do it.” the stranger phones again, the
police tell the babysitter to leave
Though del Toro is a huge draw in Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark is in the house immediately and arrive
anybody’s eyes, the script also caught cinemas from 23 August. on the scene. The calls were coming
Øvredal’s attention. Upon reading it for the from inside the house, and the
caller phoned after murdering the
Never, ever read from children upstairs.
a creepy book...
HIGH BEAMS
...especially when it’s
in a creepy house. While driving one night, a woman
is alarmed to find a car has been
WWW.SCIFINOW.CO.UK following her for some time. Not
backing down, the driver flashes
his high beams at her, tailgates her,
and even starts ramming her car
with his own. Heart pounding, she
finally makes it home after giving
the driver the slip, only to find that
he was trying to warn her that
there was a murderer hiding in the
backseat. Each time the killer sat up
to attack her, the other driver flashed
his lights or rammed her with his car
and the killer ducked back down.
THE RED SPOT
While holidaying in an exotic
location, a young northern woman
spends her time on the beaches,
relaxing and soaking in the sun’s
rays. But her time in paradise
quickly goes to hell when she is
bitten on the cheek by spider. It’s not
long before the spider bite swells
into a large boil, so the woman
decides to get it looked at by a
doctor. After poking and prodding,
the doctor lances the boil, only to
find that the spider had laid eggs
inside her face and hundreds of
tiny spiders come running out. The
woman goes insane from the shock.
| 045
© Rex Features
DUNCAN JONES
One Giant Leap
TEN YEARS AGO, DUNCAN JONES BROKE OUT WITH
MOON. WE TALK TO THE FILMMAKER ABOUT HIS
DAZZLING DEBUT AND HOW THE LESSONS LEARNED
ARE STILL PAYING OFF ON HIS NEW PROJECTS
WORDS JOSH SLATER-WILLIAMS
IN 2009, A MODESTLY BUDGETED Ten years on from its release, during which
BRITISH SCI-FI, STARRING AN AMERICAN Jones has gone on to direct three further
CHARACTER ACTOR WHO HADN’T YET features and star Sam Rockwell has won an
BROKEN OUT AS A LEADING MAN, Oscar, Moon is now debuting on the 4K Ultra
BECAME ONE OF THE TOASTS OF THE HD Blu-ray format, which has involved a loving
SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL AND ONE OF restoration of the film’s materials. “It was myself
THE MOST ACCLAIMED GENRE FILMS OF and Stuart Fenegan, my producer, who were
THAT YEAR. eager to celebrate the fact that anyone actually
still remembered Moon after ten years,” says
Moon, the first feature from director Duncan an enthusiastic Jones, calling from Los Angeles.
Jones, who wrote the film’s story that Nathan “When we made the film, we were concerned
Parker turned into a screenplay, went on to about whether it was even going to get into
win the Michael Powell Award for Best British cinemas and that anyone was going to see it,
Feature at the Edinburgh International Film so we were both so excited about being able to
Festival, the top film and directing prizes at the celebrate our tenth anniversary. What can we
British Independent Film Awards, and a BAFTA do? We've got to be able to do something.
for Outstanding Debut by a British Writer,
Director or Producer for Jones. “Fortunately, Sony has been so pleased with
the way that people received the film that it was
| 047
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