Here’s yet ANOTHER clip from Ender’s Game released by Movieweb. This clip, called ‘Ready Enough’, shows Mazer Rackham and Colonel Graff debating whether Ender is the one who will lead them to victory and save them all.
Tag: Mazer Rackham
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VIDEO: Ender’s Game Clip ‘You Will Be The Last’
Here’s a second clip from Ender’s Game showing Ender at Command School losing a lot of ships in a battle and then being reprimanded by Mazer. I guess we finally know why Ender was being glared at in that still!
Source: JoBlo
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Hi-Res Version of Ender, Graff, and Mazer
Thanks to La Stratégie Ender on Facebook, we now have a high-res version of the still from Entertainment Weekly’s Fall preview of Ender’s Game, which shows a rather rigid looking Mazer Rackham watching Ender get reprimanded by Colonel Graff.
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Hi-Res Scans from the ‘Ender’s Game’ Calendar
The Ender’s Game wall calender shipped out last week and finally made its way to my mailbox this afternoon. After nearly chucking my scanner out the window, I managed to get some decent scans, though I only pieced together a couple of the images. The ones that didn’t lose much with one scan I left as-is. We’d previously posted images from Ender News, but there were a couple of additional new images in the calendar for us to gawk at.
Please be warned that there are MOVIE SPOILERS beyond this point.
IN CASE YOUR EYES MISSED IT, THERE ARE SPOILERS.
Since it’s a 16 month calendar, the first page with the army logos contains all four months left in 2013: September-December.
January features the Battle School, which I did not scan since we’ve seen a lot of it already. The image looked like it was taken from a short video on display at the Ender’s Game Experience. The caption for it appears to be incorrect, as it says:
A shuttle returning Ender and Colonel Graff to Earth after Ender quits Battle School.
February features the image released by Empire magazine of Ender floating while Graff watches at the gate.
In his relentless quest to isolate the cadet and mold him into the leader he needs, Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) orders Ender (Asa Butterfield) to be the first to brave the stomach-churning drop into the zero-gravity Battle Room. Ender pushes off and flies out uncertainly into the vast empty space with steel stars drifting about like asteroids.
Next to the month is a still of Valentine and Ender.
After rehashing the fight with Stilson and losing his monitor (or chance to enter the training program), Ender (Asa Butterfield) and Valentine (Abigail Breslin) are surprised by their brother, Peter, who mocks the failed cadet and proposes a game of Formics and Astronauts.
I’m sorry, but the term “formics and astronauts” makes me snort-laugh.
March moves on to Battle School with a still of the Launchy barracks. You can see Bernard on the far right and Bean next to him.
Sergeant Dap (Nonso Anozie) calls attention on deck as Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) enters the Launchie dormitory to announce that he’s pleased with their progress and, with some failed seniors leaving soon, he’ll be looking to promote some of them.
On the month page, there’s an image of their locker that I didn’t scan.
Ender takes the only free bed in the Launchie dormitory, and approaches the shiny locker next to it. At the sound of his voice, the locker spins open to reveal a slightly stiff, anodized spacesuit, flight boots and gloves, an aerodynamic helmet, and a pistol-like gun.
In April, there’s a classroom scene with Ender in the center, Bernard in the top row on the left, and Alai at the top on the right.
With Ender (Asa Butterfield), Bean (Aramis Knight), and Alai (Suraj Partha) the only passing scores on the Deep Space Navigation Test, Professor Behari (Jasmine Kaur) encourages one of them to step forward and educate the class on using the gravitational pull of a planet to slingshot fighter craft into attack formation on the dark side of a moon.
The month image shows the planet image we get a glimpse of in the trailer and this is apparently for the lesson mentioned above.
May features Ender and Bernard in Launchy suits.
Given only ten minutes to suit up with helmet and weapon, Ender (Asa Butterfield) and the other Launchies listen intently as Colonel Graff introduces them to the zero-gravity Battle Room.
Rows of Launchies stand at attention in the Battle Room Staging Area, as Dap (Nonso Anozie) looks on and Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) prepares to send them into the zero-gravity Battle Room for the first time.
June features the still we saw of Ender and Petra in the mess hall. On the calendar page is an image of Ender in his Launchy suit.
Petra Arkanian (Hailee Steinfeld), the only girl in Salamander Army, befriends Ender (Asa Butterfield) when he is reassigned to her platoon. Their leader, Bonzo Madrid, forbids Ender to unholster his weapon, but Petra takes the inexperienced recruit under her wing.
Ender (Asa Butterfield) looks down across the sea of kids in the Mess Hall watching the Battle Room Games scoreboard flash Game Over, and Bonzo Madrid’s Salamander Army remains on top. Aware of the lingering Launchie, Bonzo tells Ender to keep his eyes on the floor and sends him to face a wall with a lone kid in a Salamander uniform.
July takes us to the Battle Room staging area with Ender and Petra.
Though the Salamander Army leader, Bonzo Madrid, has forbidden Ender (Asa Butterfield) to unholster his weapon for fear the inexperienced Launchie will screw up his platoon’s perfect maneuvers, Petra Arkanian (Hailee Steinfeld) takes Ender under her wing and practices with him in the Battle Room during her free time.
Below that is the formation image of Dragon Army.
In forty-two battles nobody has beaten Ender’s Dragon Army, a platoon of misfits and oddballs. Graff, pressured by Command School for a decision to promote the brilliant strategist, doubles the enemy for the next maneuvers in the Battle Room. Whichever side gets a cadet through the enemy’s gate unharmed will win, regardless of points scored. In a stroke of tactical genius, Ender stacks multiple rows of cadets in formation.
August brings a confrontation between Ender and Graff and Anderson. This still was shown at the Ender’s Game Experience.
Ender (Asa Butterfield) confronts Colonel Hyrum Graff (Harrison Ford) for pitting him against his fellow Launchies on the shuttle ride to Battle School. Major Anderson (Viola Davis) is amused, but resists a desire to challenge her superior’s tactics with his young protege.
On the calendar page is Bean emerging from the shuttle.
Arriving at Battle School orbiting high above Earth, Bean (Aramis Knight) disembarks the Desert Salt Flats shuttle through the docking airlock, and hears a voice over the loudspeaker instructing Launchies (new arrivals) to follow the yellow lights.
September brings a new image we haven’t seen before of Mazer and Ender on Eros.
Above the viewing station high above the Battle Simulation Room of the International Fleet’s forward outpost, Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) sharply reminds Ender (Asa Butterfield) that the Formics’ very existence is a threat. Mazer Rackham (Sir Ben Kingsley) leads Ender down a long walkway deep in the reclaimed caves of Eros to a command console that looks out over giant holographic projectors bolted to the roof and row upon row of flight simulator pods.
On the calendar page, we see a diagram of a Formic.
Here’s another new image of Ender on Eros. I had to piece this one together so you might see some color differences.
Ender (Asa Butterfield) leads the attack on the Formics from the deck of the Command School.
This month’s page shows the image of Anderson looking at the scan of a head and as I’d suspected, she’s looking at Bonzo.
Major Anderson (Viola Davis) studies an X-ray that shows the fracture that Bonzo Madrid suffered in a fight with Ender. Back in his office, as Graff justifies training children to win the war, Anderson realizes there is no place for her in the school and announces her resignation.
Whoa! Right after I read that I felt spoiled, ugh!
November brings us to that outside image with two figures standing in the sunlight.
Certain the Formics were simply preparing to defend themselves, Ender (Asa Butterfield) awakes from a dream and runs down a low corridor with Petra racing close behind. She follows him through an airlock chamber leading out across the ravaged surface of Eros, and they stumble to a stop in front of two fallen Formic spires.
The calendar page here features one of Ender commanding ships that we’ve seen in the trailer.
The simulator blinks on and Ender (Asa Butterfield) sees the little doctor and its squadron of fighters moving silently through space. He zooms in on the red glow of the Formic home planet and despairs to see hundreds of motherships looming above him. Bean looks up and reminds Ender that the enemy’s gate is down, snapping him out of the reverie, and with a sweeping gesture he reorients the simulation so that Ender and his team now loom over the enemy.
Woohoo! Sounds like Bean’s line made it in! *celebrations*
December is the last month and features an image of Petra looking through her screen, as seen in the trailer.
After unleashing the Little Doctor on the swarm of Formic fighters at Ender’s command, Petra watches as a wave of destruction radiates outward from the point of impact.
The final photo is from the lake scene with Valentine. I couldn’t crop this one well, so I cut out the calendar part.
A homemade raft is tethered at the end of a wooden jetty at the International Fleet’s Veterans Retreat, a remote lakeside wilderness where Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield) greets his beloved sister, Valentine (Abigail Breslin).
Still no Peter Wiggin!
The calendar is pretty awesome and you can currently buy it from Amazon for $13.49. Glossy and full of Ender goodness, it’s totally worth the price. It really makes me anxious to see the making-of book now! It doesn’t seem to be available on Barnes & Noble anymore, but the last I heard from a local store was that they were expecting to get some in. The MSRP is $14.99.
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PHOTO: Ender’s Game Instagram Collage
The Ender’s Game Instagram account spent today unveiling pieces of a new collage today with the awesome tagline “The future must be won”. Kelly and I agreed on a recent episode of EnderCast that this was an amazing tagline so it’s great to see them using it. The full image is below:
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PHOTO: New Shot of Mazer Rackham
Summit posted a new photo collage to their Ender’s Game social media channel today with a new image of Mazer Rackham. And while it’s not really anything new, it’s still an image we haven’t seen before. Hopefully as we get closer we’ll start to see tv spots and clips. I know I want to see character profile clips!
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PHOTO: Graff and Mazer Rackham Face Off with Ender Wiggin
Although we just posted an image that is from Entertainment Weekly’s Fall Movie Preview, turns out that was the bonus tablet image. The image above, which shows Mazer Rackham looking at Ender while Graff gives Ender an angry look, is the actual image from the print issue on stands today. (look for the Anchorman 2 issue)
In the brief article, Gavin Hood talks about how when he told his visual effects supervisor what he wanted for the Battle Room, “his eyes nearly popped out of his head”.
HUGE thanks to my friend Michelle for helping me view this on her iPad!
Source: Entertainment Weekly tablet edition
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Evaluating the Potential Impact of ‘Ender’s Game’ on Movie Audiences
Now that the final trailer for Ender’s Game has been released, armchair critics around the world are typing out their opinions on “the nets” with comments ranging from a simple, “SPOILERS” to “this movie looks amazing” to “this movie looks awful”.
For book fans, a common kneejerk reaction to the new trailer is the complaint that it’s made pretty clear that the major “twist” of the Ender’s Game book–that it’s all really happening–is not preserved for movie audiences. And yet, I’m sure we all can eventually realize that as long as the truth is hidden from Ender, the heart of the story is intact.
When I first saw the trailer at Comic Con, I tweeted about this audience perspective topic because it somehow surprised me. Since I think a lot about this movie adaptation, I’d known for a really long time that it was possible they’d open this part of the story up, but seeing it on the screen was still a bit of a shock. Now that I’ve actually had the chance to watch the trailer as many times as I’d like, the dust has settled and I’ve come to realize the amazing potential of such a decision by the filmmakers.
The most important thing to realize right from the start is that Ender’s Game is a film adaptation. A book is a book and a movie is a movie. I know we book fanatics can sometimes be so stuck to the pages of a novel that we can’t see the painfully obvious–that impactful scenes in books can translate into awfully dull scenes in movies.
Mind you, this is not a criticism of Card’s book. I obviously wouldn’t have started this site and invested so much into it if I didn’t truly love the book he wrote. They’re simply different mediums. Let’s look at Eros. The environment Card put Ender in worked exceptionally well for an individual holed up somewhere with their nose in a book because let’s face it, we all read alone.
We feel isolated in some way when we sink into the world of a story and that’s probably part of the reason why we felt a kind of relationship with Ender Wiggin. You felt alone with Ender Wiggin in that isolated simulator room with Mazer Rackham breathing over his (and your) shoulders. You can immerse yourself into his situation and for some people this creates tunnel vision, which is what makes the final reveal of the twist so jarring.
Movies, however, are an entirely different experience. Rather than relying on imagination, movies depend entirely on visual appeal, sound effects, and performances. Movies must also present a much broader picture in much less time, which becomes a crutch for telling such a complex story as Ender’s.
The reason so many of us are so attached to the story of Ender is that it made us think. After it was over, there was so much to talk about and contemplate regarding morals and ethics, which is probably why it’s taught in so many schools.
Books have the luxury of having pages and pages to explain the complexities of plot, but to preserve his twist, Card doesn’t actually do this during Ender’s “gaming”. He left the explanations for the post-war section of the book. The movie could do the same, but the flow would be interrupted because people would have to think back to what he did. With prior knowledge of what the teachers are hiding from Ender, audiences are set up for a bigger emotional investment for when Ender finally learns the truth. This isn’t The Sixth Sense, nor does it have to be.
Revealing the real “game” the teachers are playing also gives us a much better look into the characters of Graff and Mazer, who are, let’s face it, marquis players in this movie’s cast. Hiding it actually seems like wasted potential for the film. By expanding upon the teachers’ moral dilemma over Ender, their characters become more complex and therefore more interesting rather than being straightforward domineering superiors.
We’ve seen only a few seconds of Graff in the trailers and a lot of it could be taken out of context, but I’m liking what I’m seeing so far. One of our readers on Facebook said that he doesn’t like how they’ve been portraying Graff, that he’s much too hardass and not the Graff he loves. I have to respectfully disagree because the brief glimpses of Graff that I’ve seen are to me true to the heart of his character.
While the book-Graff we know clearly cares for Ender, what has always made him compelling is the fact that he knows enough about what’s at stake and sets his sights on the end goal, which is the safety of the human race. He is the cornerstone for the conversations people have about this story. Do the ends justify the means? Is what they did to one boy “excusable” in order to save billions? And while Graff in the trailer does sound cold and jaded, this is the steely determined Graff that molds Ender into who he is. Without his drive, Ender may not have succeeded.
The conflicts between Graff/Mazer and Graff/Anderson would serve to highlight these issues and with audiences aware of the true nature of the destruction that Ender is causing, it ultimately makes for a much more powerful finale. In short, the emotional impact of the movie shouldn’t be that you didn’t realize what was going on. The impact should be with Ender’s realization that what you’ve just watched with the same horror as Graff and Mazer was, in fact, not a game.
“He’s in command, there’s no stopping him now.” Regarding the complaint that the trailer shows the movie’s twist, it’s really all in how you look at it. There technically is no audience twist like with the book. Instead, there’s only Ender’s twist. With the look on Graff’s face, you can imagine all his fears, his hopes, his regrets, and his sorrow. He looks as though in this moment, he finally realizes the scope of the “weapon” he’s created in Ender. And yet, the true horror he has to face is yet to come when he has to face Ender and tell him the truth. This will be the movie’s heart. And it’s not in the trailer.
I could be wrong. Perhaps the trailer has been very cleverly edited and I only think I know what they’re saying because I’ve read the book. But movies have a different level of power when it comes to evoking emotion. Gavin Hood has talked about putting pages of thinking and emotion into a single look on screen and I think that’s indicative of his own awareness of the importance of the ending.
Last December, I wrote a piece in which I talked about what Ender’s Game ultimately needs to accomplish. I said that what mattered most was that audiences realize what they’ve done to Ender and I think at that time, I thought that it rested solely on Asa Butterfield’s performance immediately following the final battle.
I can see now that the setup for that scene will be a key factor in making that performance truly successful. With that setup, his performance would be given so much more weight. And so, I want audiences to know. I want audiences to feel and despair over Ender’s actions so that when he’s finally aware, every little part of that scene clicks into place. To make people feel what I and so many of you felt when we first journeyed with Ender Wiggin would be an amazing accomplishment and a rounding success for Gavin Hood and his cast and crew.
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GALLERY: 100 Screencaps of ‘Mazer Rackham’s Run’
Here are 100 hi-res screencaps of the official film clip Mazer Rackham’s Run that Summit debuted at the Ender’s Game Experience at San Diego Comic Con 2013. Watch the video below!
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VIDEO: Graff Welcomes Launchies to Battle School
In this clip from San Diego Comic Con, exclusively revealed by Yahoo Movies, Graff greets new students to battle school, introducing more of the before seen footage of the First/Second Invasion. Looks like they will indeed make the name and story of Mazer Rackham as important and ever present in the minds of the kids as it is in the books!
Read Yahoo’s accompanying article here: Harrison Ford Delivers Ender’s Game Gravitas in a Comic-Con Exclusive!
Source: Yahoo Movies
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Six New Ender’s Game Character Posters Revealed
Moviefone and Fandango have exclusively revealed three new Ender’s Game character posters each. They look awesome! Click for higher resolution! (Especially the Fandango ones, i.e. Anderson, Mazer and Ender, are super hi-res.)
Which one is your favorite? Any you don’t like? Do you miss anyone? Tell us in the comments or sound off in our Forums!
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Five ‘Ender’s Game’ Character Posters Revealed
Early this morning, five new characters for Ender’s Game hit the web, showing major characters Ender Wiggin, Hyrum Graff, Mazer Rackham, Gwen Anderson, and Petra Arkanian. Click the images for larger versions.
UPDATE: These may not be official posters. Will update when I know more.
UPDATE 2: These posters have been confirmed as drafts and were unintentionally leaked. To which all I can say is, yay, more posters coming later? 🙂
UPDATE 3: The posters have been removed at the request of Summit.
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If Battle School Allowed Facebook Part 2
Since I’m home sick with a sore throat and a really manly sounding croaky voice, there’s no Weekly Ender this week. Here’s a few new Battle School Facebook images for your Monday, though! If you want to read the first ones, go to Part 1.
Poor Mazer gets no respect…
Dap fails at recruiting a new teacher.
Ender really getting under Mazer’s skin.
And finally, bored with Fairyland and all those creepy wolf children, Ender moves on to something else.
