EnderWiggin.net – Ender's Game Movie Fansite

Blog

Straight from the Set Part 4: Ender and His Jeesh

We were sitting in a room waiting for the young cast to come in when the silliest thought popped into my head. We were about to interview the majority of Dragon Army. I felt like a reporter in the Enderverse, chosen to fly up to Battle School to talk to the future heroes of Earth before they headed off to some undisclosed location. And then Academy-award nominated actress Hailee Steinfeld walked into the room and snapped me back to reality.

The first time I’d seen young Hailee was on screen when she was just thirteen years old. I sat in the theater with my husband watching True Grit and thought, “Just who the hell is this girl?” She blew me away. I went home and looked her up and was astounded to learn that she’d been among 15,000 girls that auditioned for the role of Mattie Ross. Watching her stand her ground with the likes of Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon while barely a teenager, I knew she was someone special. An Academy-award nomination would later confirm I wasn’t the only one who thought that.

But while acting with Jeff Bridges would clearly unnerve even an Oscar winner like Jennifer Lawrence, so having time to just be a kid with other kids must be its own breed of cool. And that’s just what she confirmed for us right off the bat. “It’s been so much fun, you know, more fun than I imagined.”

And then, before we knew it, Asa Butterfield had walked into the room. The first thing you notice about Asa (pronounced ay-sah) is how slight he is in stature. So while many of you may be having a hard time with his height, he still has this vulnerability to him because he is so thin. That is, until he stares you in the eyes. A piercing blue, our Ender Wiggin has an intense stare, one that would make any fan somehow comforted by the fact that the person playing him can make you feel intimidated even if he’s less than half your age.

We got right into talking about his audition. How exactly did director Gavin Hood find that one boy in a million to play the boy genius savior of Earth that people had been waiting literally decades for in theaters? Turns out he was in Los Angeles and auditioned for Hood in person. Later, just as he and his mother were to leave for New York to do press for Hugo, his mother walks into the room and tells him to take a deep breath. Right then, he knew he’d gotten the part. “I literally screamed. Like I was flipping out. It was amazing.”

During our interview with the producers, Linda McDonough had related a story to us about a time when the kids just couldn’t stop laughing. Under pressure to keep on schedule, the producers were agitated when the laughing spread to the crew. Hailee and Asa gave us a bit more insight into just what was so funny. Stunt coordinator Garrett Warren had put them into a wheel harness they called the “hamster wheel” that flew them around. At one point the two of them were upside down, wearing their really tight helmets.

“[It] made us look…sort of hamster-ish. Hence the name.” laughed Asa. “Usually around 5:00, 5:15 […] we reach delirious point. At which point anything, if we work together, anything we say, we’ll just be on the floor laughing.”

Off the set, the kids didn’t have much to do in New Orleans since none of them were 21, so they simply hung out together. “I think the weekend is really our time to relax so there’s just kind of going over to each other’s houses or just laying low, really. Just spending time together is, you know, the best.” said Hailee. This included things like Aramis teaching the other boys basketball and Asa teaching Suraj how to beat box.

While we’ve heard that Moises Arias (Bonzo) was intimidating to the background extras, Asa insists they were all like family and had no problems being professional once they came on set. Before they were to do the shower scene, Asa said he and Moises were fantasizing about what they were going to be doing during the fight. “We both were like wondering, “Am I going to do a back flip over you or something?”” he said, grinning. “It’s an amazing scene. [D]ifficult to shoot because they could never show me naked, but yeah, it was an amazing scene.”

When we asked about the pressure of adapting such a classic novel with a longtime fanbase, Steinfeld said she didn’t look at it as pressure so much as an honor. “I told my mom […] one of the main things I want to do in this is still appeal to the massive cult that already follows Ender’s Game.” said Asa.

As we chatted with Asa and Hailee, a monstrous man walked in the door. Being a die-hard Game of Thrones fan since the 1990s, I simply knew him as Xaro Xhoan Daxos. Nonso Anozie, who plays Sergeant Dap, had to bend over to get into the room. He then sat down and crossed his massive arms.

Trained by a real drill sergeant, Anozie admitted he wasn’t sure about something. “A few weeks before we actually started filming […] I was wondering how far I could go, if I could shout at the kids.”

We certainly wanted to know too! “He shouted.” confirmed Asa, and everyone laughed.

“After my initial few scenes I was walking around for a few days with a hoarse throat; I was screaming pretty loud.” said Anozie, chuckling.

Eventually, we were joined by a large group of cast members: the rest of the jeesh. Aramis Knight, Suraj Partha, Caleb Thaggard, Khylin Rhambo, and Conor Carroll rolled into the room and started telling us what they’d pick to take from the set. Aramis wanted the little compacted mouse they’d used earlier that day. Khylin would keep his flash gun. Caleb and Nonso said they’d definitely keep their desks. “They’re really, really cool. A lot of the stuff is working, a lot of the stuff you can actually hold and pick up. That’s the thing I like about this movie, the things you can actually grab hold of.” said Anozie.

Suraj was thinking a little bigger than the rest of them. “I [w]ould take the whole thing and literally make a museum out of it.”

When talk moved on to the Formics, they had differing opinions about the aliens. Giant ants with claws and teeth. Intimidating. Advanced, like a threat. Conor said he was most afraid of the thought of being a Formic because that’d mean he’d have to be around Formics all the time. Yet they’re not without their own unique beauty. As Suraj put it, “You’re supposed to be grossed out by them but they’ve done a good job with the color, really making them creatures that, once you get to know them, you would love them and you’d want to live in peace with them. It’s really interesting.”

They’ve talked extensively in other interviews about going to Space Camp for training and they were more than excited to tell us about all the muscles they’d developed with all the physical training involved.

Khylin told us one of the things he was most anxious about was how it would turn out, since it was no doubt going to be difficult acting and somersaulting while being in pain. However, with daily practice, it wasn’t nearly as bad as he’d anticipated. There may have been some joking about 6, 12, 18, and 20 packs. One of the most fun stunts they did was their first going into the Battle Room. “It was on a zip line.” recalled Khylin. “And they said, “Let go. Go as fast as you want, run, whatever you want to do and like if you want to flip or you just jump out.” It was amazing.”

While at Space Camp, they even got fly a simulator, though none of them were good at it except for Suraj. “I literally crashed my plane at least 17 times.” admitted Conor.

To get themselves riled up for filming, they’d chant and even gave us a demonstration. “We had a bunch of different chants.

As mentioned in our talk with Christine Bieselin-Clark, the flash suits were fantastic, but when we asked if they were comfortable… “NO. No, no.” they all agreed. “My favorite looking is the flash suits.” joked Khylin.

The way Suraj tells it, getting dressed in their flash suits sounded like the scene in Ender’s Shadow when Bean has to jury rig his suit to fit his small body and it’s in pieces at his feet. “I don’t think that anyone is ever going to realize that to get these things on we had like 4 people on us tugging at the pants, trying to get the jacket over, and trying to zip this up so this is.” And Bean did chime in on the difficulty.

“I remember the first time and all of us tried it on at the same time and I remember all of us were like, “Yeah! We can do this.” Fifteen minutes later: “I can’t do this.” ‘Cause, it’s not like it’s really like… you can move, it just gets tough to breathe after a while because it’s tight and so well-fitted. And it also gets hot cause there were at least nine layers, at least.”

Lucky for them though, there was no strict diet. Just a friendly reminder here and there to stop growing so fast, though the training would make them bulk up enough where the initial fitted suit was too tight. “I almost fainted. It was like getting hugged by Nonso.” said Khylin. Even so, cast-mate Moises would always try his best to keep the rest of them eating right.

“He won’t eat anything unhealthy. He is the most healthy person I’ve ever met.” said Suraj. As if on cue, we suddenly found ourselves talking favorite Pop Tarts, a conversation that no doubt would have had Moises shaking his head. Aramis was bemoaning the fact that he can’t find his favorite Wild Berry type in LA, when someone told him that they’ve spotted those before. He quickly raised his hand to his mom in the back of the room, saying, “Write that down!”

Just as Caleb was telling us about setting a toaster on fire while trying to toast a S’mores Pop Tart, Nonso dropped the bombshell on us. He’d never had one. “They’re like little toasty things with jam inside?” he asked.

As for whether they’re signed on to do more movies? Caleb had the most straightforward answer. “Let’s just say this: Hopefully people buy enough tickets and we’ll all get to find out.”

Hopefully indeed!

Our set visit reports will conclude tomorrow with our interview with stunt coordinator Garrett Warren, set designers Ben Proctor and Sean Haworth, and Sir Ben Kingsley.

September 3, 2013
PHOTO: Ender and Bean as Launchies in the Battle Room

The LA Times has published a set visit report and an interview with director Gavin Hood and gives us a bit more insight on how he came up with the Battle Room’s design. In addition to that, we have a photo of Ender and Bean in the Battle Room!

As written in the novel, the Battle Room feels like a big, dark room, and the “Ender’s Game” combat situations unfold on something akin to personal computers.

“You had to feel it was the real thing — not a video game on a screen,” Orci said. “Visually, it had to be visceral, a you-are-there experience.”

Hood says two chance visits to Los Angeles landmarks — Griffith Observatory for a planetarium show and Disney Hall for a symphony concert — helped him solve two of his most pressing visual obstacles.

During the planetarium show, Hood realized that the battling spaceships could fly around Ender and his subcommanders like so many spinning galaxies inside the domed Griffith theater, immersing the cast (and the audience) in the clashes. And in watching Gustavo Dudamel lead the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the filmmaker figured out that Ender could conduct his team of pilots as if he were guiding them through a prestissimo symphony — front and center, orchestrating everyone’s movements in harmony.

Hood’s production designers also enveloped the Battle Room with panoramic windows, so that the cadets were both figuratively and literally floating amid the stars. “What is the point of going into space and being stuck in a black box?” Hood said.

You can read the entire piece at LA Time’s Hero Complex.

August 30, 2013
Straight from the Set Part 3: Flash Suits and Flash Guns

You are reading Part 3 of a five-part Ender’s Game set report series scheduled for the next week.

Two years ago, in July 2011, EnderWiggin.net was born. I’d been Googling “Ender’s Game movie” every year or so and finally a promising hit came back with the names “Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman”. I thought, “Well, I know those guys. They write practically everything awesome for both TV and movies.” After years of disappointment, this finally sounded like something might be happening.

Little did I know that less than three months later, costume designer Christine Bieselin-Clark would begin the process of designing the flash suits that, for years, had only existed as fan art or comic illustrations. After nailing down the basic concept at the end of 2011, they began 3D digital prototyping to make them gorgeous, functional, and practical. Four specific army suits were created for use in Battle Room scenes, among them were Launchie, Salamander, and Dragon.

Eventually, Bieselin-Clark, who had done the costumes for TRON: Legacy, found herself giving a bunch of Ender’s Game nerds a tour of her little costume office on the set. Flash suits hung on a rack in the corner, photographs of the cast lined the walls, and in a corner wall the emblems which represent the Battle School armies were laid out for us to feast our eyes on. There were nine in total for Launchie, Dragon, Leopard, Rat, Centipede, Snake (which we now know as Asp), Griffin, Phoenix, and Salamander.

Bieselin-Clark credited graphic artist Zach Bannon with the design of the army logos, telling us that it was a tedious process of finding the right balance between sleek and simple yet interesting.

For the standard Battle School uniforms, the logos would be burned in to create recessed urethane patches, essentially rubber, which gave them dimension and at the same time curved to the body in a natural way with the uniforms. “Instead of there being patches or things that are embroidered, which is so identifiable to the current military, we did things that were molded and cast.”

They wanted to avoid having uniforms that looked distinctly American, so a stand collar was used, which is found more often in Middle Eastern uniforms. Still, subtlety was important to director Gavin Hood, who believed that the uniforms shouldn’t stand out too much, providing a backdrop rather than being the focus. They didn’t go strictly futuristic, either. “If you think about fashion, fashion is repetitive: there are style lines that you see now that you can point to the 60s or the 80s and say, “Oh, that’s from that time period.” But it’s present-tense, so to create something for the future, even the military, we borrowed significant style lines from all different time periods.”

When it came to the flash suits, she explained that they went for rich, saturated colors to avoid being too cute. “When you get a lot of colors going like that and they’re all kind of poppy, it seems so adorable, which isn’t really the tone of this film that we’re going for.” she laughed. To accent the dusty gray of the suit, they added just a few touches of color, such as burnt orange for Dragon and olive green for Salamander.

Using lasers and resin, they built the helmets from the ground up. By the time production ended, they’d custom built a total of 78 helmets, with the principal cast having helmets tailored specifically for their bodies. The logo on the back of the helmet was something they needed to be able to replicate quickly in case of wear and tear, so they used what was essentially a sticker that had twelve ink passes to give it some texture to tack onto the backs.

The construction of the helmet itself sounded incredibly complicated, being comprised of three separate parts: the base helmet, the mandible, and the visor. Because of potential lighting issues and reflections in the glass, they had to be able to remove the visor if needed. “We didn’t have to do that too much, though, because [our cinematographer] Don McAlpine is a genius.”

The mandible was attached magnetically and fans were built into the helmet to help with air circulation. The visor, which was attached using a clip-in system, needed open space near the mouth area so the kids could breathe and so that they wouldn’t fog up the visor while talking during filming.

And while the cast may have enjoyed the cooling effects of the fan, that was a luxury that could be taken away at any moment to avoid disruption of sound while shooting. Bieselin-Clark says they installed lithium ion batteries to control the fans by remote.

“We had to be able to shut them off without too much trouble. It was like a keyring with a bunch of car clickers on it: we’d walk around, and everyone had a little label on there so we knew who we were able to turn on and off.”

With most of the young cast being on set right smack in the middle of puberty, Bieselin-Clark said they had to design the flash suits with growth in mind. The suit was constructed of several separate pieces, with the pants extending up underneath the jacket. That way, if the jacket began to creep up, there was still fabric there to provide them with some coverage. The boots overlaid part of the pants leg and the gloves overlaid the arm.

With these design traits in place, they were able to make concessions for them quickly, rather than in a panic. “[There was no] “Oh my God, we have to make Asa a new suit. For tomorrow. That would have been awful.”

With multiples of everything, she was able to go on-set some days and have the sewing shop drop the hemline another inch on their flight suits as needed without disrupting the flow of the shoot.

Finally, one of us got up the courage to ask, “Is it okay if we touch these flash suits?” She laughed, saying as long as producer Bob Orci said it was okay. He gave us the go-ahead with a quick, “Oh, why not?” And while I give her all the credit in the world for the work she did on those suits, they still felt stiff and wearing something like that seemed like it’d be uncomfortable over a length of time, which was probably why the cast was so crazy about their plain white pajamas.

“Those kids!” she said, laughing. “Let’s just say when you put a bunch of kids in flash suits for weeks on end, then you’re like, “Now you get to go to the dorms, everyone get in bed. Put your pajamas on.” Of course they thought they were the best things ever.”

It was interesting to hear the thought process that went into designing costumes for characters such as Valentine. There was definitely a degree of desexualization for the female characters because they wanted to maintain the innocence of the kids since it’s part of the defining aspect of them as a whole. “If Valentine starts seeming sexy in some way, you just mess the whole thing up. […] You want her to be adorable, loving and charming.”

When asked if she had to do any costuming for the Formics, she adamantly denied it. “I am not costuming an alien on this movie. That is my final answer.”

“No, no, cause we wanted the aliens sexualized.” joked Orci.

She quipped back at him, “The Formic plunging neckline! We’re working on that.”

As we continued to admire the patches on the flash suits, talk shifted to what great shoulder tattoos the logos would make for diehard Ender’s Game fans. “Let’s do it tonight!” exclaimed Ryan from Fons PR.

“You are in the right town for that, just go down to Bourbon Street. We’ll send the tattoo artist the Illustrator files so they get it right.” Bieselin-Clark offered jokingly. Eventually the topic of socks in Battle School came up and they started talking about something that was both mildly thrilling and yet somewhat terrifying for a fansite.

“Turns out Garrett [Warren] reads all your blogs.” said producer Linda McDonough.

“We read all of it.” confirmed Bieselin-Clark. “We really do. And we don’t read it because we’re like, “Ooh what are they saying?” We read it because we want to know what everyone’s keen on. We want to know, what is it that’s really valuable? What is it that’s really important? And we don’t want to mess it up. We don’t want anyone to be disappointed. We want everyone to enjoy this.”

With what we saw in that office, it’s hard to imagine fans not enjoying the costumes she’d so carefully brought into reality.

Be sure to read EnderWiggin.net’s exclusive interview with Christine Bieselin-Clark at San Diego Comic Con for more on the flash suits and how they kept them clean.

Continue reading our report with details from the propmaster >>

August 30, 2013
PHOTOS: More from the Lasertag Arena at Gamescom

Gamescom wrapped up last week and Constantin Film put up a lot of great photos of the event on the official German Facebook page for Ender’s Game. You can check out some of them below!

August 29, 2013
Straight from the Set Part 2: In-Depth with Gavin Hood

You are reading Part 2 of a five-part Ender’s Game set report series scheduled for the next week.

Before I stepped on the set of Ender’s Game last May, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Would I be bored? Should I bring a book? What the heck was I going to do without my phone for an entire day?

I’d been on sets before, having been a background extra for tv shows and movies and it’s usually fun, but it can also be a pretty dull affair. I’ve been yelled at by an assistant director and hilariously over-the-top coached by a PA who would eventually end up having a baby with Evangeline Lilly. I spent an afternoon as a booze cruise passenger on a boat off Waikiki, at one point with George Clooney an arm’s reach away. In contrast, I once spent an entire day napping on a concrete floor, never getting picked for any scenes.

But I’d never been on a set as press and I’d certainly never met a director before. So when Gavin Hood walked into our little chat with the cast and proceeded to talk to us with genuine excitement and friendliness, it definitely made for an amazing first impression.

Since our time on set I’ve had the pleasure of speaking with Hood twice and each time he’s been gracious and exceptionally open to talking Ender’s Game. Mention his name to the young cast and their faces immediately light up as they excitedly proclaim how amazing it was to work under his direction.

We were in the middle of listening to Asa Butterfield (Ender Wiggin) trying to describe the process for what I like to call “arm acting”. Someone in the room had asked how he does it with nothing there as a guide.

Hood, more than happy to describe the process to us in detail, explained that it wasn’t up to Butterfield to get each point of a specific motion exactly right, but rather the reverse: the graphic artists work around the motions Butterfield uses. “It’s not like, “Oh my God, you have to point at exactly that because that is where that graphic is.” Well, the graphic isn’t there yet.” he explained. “It’s kind of organic.”

Another area that the young actors had to visualize on their own was the Mind Game, which is interspersed in short bits throughout the movie and is used to present moments of discomfort that ultimately shape Ender’s moral compass with audiences. Hood recounted a scene with Ender and Alai, in which Alai is watching Ender play the Giant’s Drink and becomes alarmed when he has the mouse gouge the eye out of the giant. Ender’s facial emotion when confronted by Alai can speak volumes for his character. “That’s what great acting is. It’s that moment when that awkwardness from that little act that tells you volumes in an unspoken way.”

More Than Just Another Space Movie

Hood spoke a lot about how important it was to him to present a story that got kids talking. Is this good leadership? Bad? Is it responsible? Was Ender right or wrong? And while he’s said that he’s most excited for fans to see the Battle Room sequences, he’s not all about the epic battles and confrontations.

“So often there are films that we go to and they’re fantastic and they’re fun and they’re wonderful. But it’s like, “Well, that was great. Wanna get pizza?” as opposed to a story like Ender’s Game where kids really talk about it. “Well, what do you think about the way Ender made that decision? Was he too violent, or wasn’t he?” These are important conversations, I think, for young people to engage in in an exciting way. If you can deliver that kind of debate and conversation in an exciting, visually powerful way, then I think you’re getting a little more than just spectacle.”

Ender’s Game is not going to lack in spectacle, but it meant a lot of work in pre-production, especially since they were building so many real sets. Nonso Anozie, who plays Sergeant Dap, said the sets really helped him as an actor. “You’re not just looking at green screen all the time. There’s a lot of reality there. And as an actor it’s so good.”

It also took the combined efforts of production designers, sculptors, concept artists, and many more to ready the set for shooting. “You don’t just arrive and say, “Hey! What does the set look like?”” Hood joked.

Inspiration and Adaptation

When asked what his favorite sci-fi movie is, he quickly named 2001: A Space Odyssey and told us that it played a small role in attracting him to Ender’s Game. “[Kubrick] had an amazing digital sense and an amazing ability to combine adventure with thought-provoking material and give you a sense of both an epic journey and an awe-inspiring journey as well as an emotional story.” That certainly is a fitting way to describe the story of Ender Wiggin.

It wasn’t just about adventure though, but character. Hood was certainly aware that the film was ultimately about Ender, but the kids around him completed a puzzle that, when put together, was special and unique. “You’ve got all these marvelous, strong, well-defined characters engaged in really human and emotional stories. Bean, and Dink, and Alai, and Bernard […] and obviously Petra and Sergeant Dap. I just think it’s rich in character.”

Attracted to stories that follow characters at defining points in their lives, Hood went on to explain his personal connection to the story of Ender. Drafted into the military at the age of 17, he knew on a personal level how it felt to be looked upon as a number in an organization with authority figures he was not supposed to question. “I connected with this book in many ways based on, I think, feelings and experiences that I had had.”

When we asked about the challenges of adapting a beloved novel, Hood referenced his work on Tsotsi, another book to film adaptation he directed that won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2006.

“It was an adaptation in which I made many changes — and [the author] was very pleased with it. He said, “Because you stayed true to the spirit of the character.” So I try to think of my characters when I’m adapting as existing outside of the material. I’m not adapting a book. Sounds like sacrilege: I am not adapting a book. I’m collaborating with an extraordinary artist who wrote that book who described the character in his medium, that now has to be translated into another medium.”

As an example, he asked us to imagine being given a photograph to create an oil painting and a sculpture. The three mediums are then presented to a class, who then proclaim that the oil painting looks nothing like the sculpture. “Of course it doesn’t. That’s an oil painting and that’s a sculpture. The question becomes: Does the oil painting capture the spirit of this boy in some unique way? Does a pencil sketch capture his spirit in a way that moves you? Does the sculpture capture the spirit in a way that moves you? And that for me is the same with books.”

Since a lot of what happens in the book are internal thoughts of Ender, Hood had to create a lot of scenes that generated feeling in a completely different way than a book. He talked about finding moments underneath and between the lines of two characters interacting. It was a challenge that followed him into the representation of two other exceptionally gifted Wiggin children.

Locke and Demosthenes

In the novel, Peter and Valentine progress as characters into the online personas of Locke and Demosthenes. But while political maneuvering and anonymous blogging can work really well on paper, it clearly wouldn’t translate very well into film. However, that did not mean that the complexities of Ender’s siblings themselves wasn’t enough to contribute to Ender’s life. “We meet Peter at the beginning of the movie, and he has everything I think that the book has, of that aggression and bully and nastiness.” explained Hood. “But […] if you had interviewed Peter and said, “Why are you doing this?” he would say, “Because [Ender] has to toughen up or he’s not going to make it.” He’s engaged in what he would justify as tough love.”

The concept of Peter’s idea of tough love is re-introduced in the third act of the film and he talked about how he did it with a scene with Valentine that is not in the book. As if sensing our interest at the mention of this scene, he then described adapting a novel as both exciting and absolutely terrifying.

“Hopefully at the end of this you go, “My God, that was an amazing representation of Ender Wiggin and those characters in a totally different medium.” If we fail at that, we fail.” Regardless of what that outcome will be, he seemed genuinely happy watching the kids grow as actors before his eyes.

“I’m really very proud of them, very proud.”

Be sure to return tomorrow to read Part 3 of our set visit report, which will cover costumes, props, and our quick chat with stunt coordinator Garrett Warren.

But before I end Part 2, I wanted to share with you all a little thing I learned while IMDBing Gavin Hood last night. As it turns out, the director didn’t just have life experience to draw on for Ender’s Game. He’s got Hollywood experience with science fiction and the military as well!

Yup, that’s Gavin Hood in a Season 8 episode of Stargate: SG-1 as Colonel Alexi Vaselov, a Russian military pilot that yearns to join a Stargate team but ends up sending the SGC into lockdown. If Harrison Ford hadn’t been available, could Richard Dean Anderson have filled Graff’s shoes? 😉

August 29, 2013
First Look at Ender and Petra Funko Pop! Vinyl Figures

We first reported a couple of weeks ago that Funko was going to be releasing Pop! Vinyl figures for Ender and Petra, but no images were available. Thanks to a tip from @franiahs and @AsanatorWorld, we get to see what the figures will look like!

Here’s Ender in a Dragon Army flash suit with a cute little flash gun!

And here’s Petra in a Salamander Army flash suit!

The figures will be released sometime in November and can already be pre-ordered for $9.99 each from Entertainment Earth.

August 28, 2013
Ain’t It Cool News on the Rebirth of Dragon Army

Ain’t It Cool News has posted their set visit report and in it they provide us with the scene where Ender is assigned Commander of Dragon Army.

“[Y]ou have a habit of upsetting your commander.”

Ender replies “I find it hard to respect someone just because he outranks me, sir.” At this, Graff leans back in his chair, giving Ender his full attention, rocking back and forth slightly.

“That puts you in a difficult position, doesn’t it? You don’t like taking orders from Bonzo… perhaps you’d prefer to give them,” says Graff slyly, kind of like a parent about to unveil a Christmas present. Ender is confused. “Sir?”

Graff: “How would you like your own army? Dragon Army.”

Ender: “Sir, I’ve never heard of Dragon Army.”

Graff: “We discontinued the name four years ago. No Dragon Army ever won a battle.”

Ender: “Why not a new name, sir?”

Graff: “Because we already have the uniforms.”

Ender: “Who will be in this army?”

Graff: “Misfits, like yourself. Outcasts who might just be brilliant with the right commander.”

It should be noted that this is his transcript of the original scene he saw and that later takes may have changed it. Still a cool look into Ender’s promotion into Dragon Army, though! He also mentions the scene that we see in the trailer that Khylin Rhambo confirmed on EnderCast was with him and Hailee Steinfeld.

I didn’t spend much time in the Battle Room set, but I did see Hailee Steinfeld film a scene with Khylin Rhambo, who plays Dink Meeker. It’s one of Ender’s gambits where one person from his army is sacrificed and used as a human shield. In this case Dink is frozen into place and Petra (Steinfeld) takes his flash gun and fires John Woo style as Dink hugs her, protecting her from enemy fire.

In order to get this shot they had to get on a weird little contraption that the wire team called the lollipop. Imagine a bar stool seat attached to a long stick with one affixed wire attached at the middle. Hailee sat on the seat, Dink on the bar, his arms over her shoulders and her legs wrapped around his waist with both her arms shot out under his shoulders firing away as they float away from the enemy gate.

Dink whispers “Did you get him?” Petra smiles and says, “Oh yeah.” He’s looking behind her and sees their momentum is taking them on a crash course with a star and they both cringe, anticipating the impact.

Read his whole report here, including an amusing interaction with Harrison Ford.

August 28, 2013
‘Ender’s Game’ Shot Five Battle Room Scenes

Set visit reports are pouring out today and Slashfilm’s piece had a particularly interesting tidbit of info that should relieve fans still worried about author Orson Scott Card’s comments last year about how one Battle Room scene was “one too many”.

There will be about five scenes in the Battle Room and it took about 4 weeks to shoot them all.

Whatever the cost, producers knew the zero gravity battle scenes had to be done right. Stunt coordinator Garrett Warren said he was never given any kind of restrictions in developing the zero gravity tech because everyone knew the movie hinged on it.

Hood and Warren looked at all kinds of different ways to capture the zero gravity including, but not limited to, actually filming in real zero gravity. They investigated more mundane solutions such as computer graphics and motion-capture, but eventually decided on elaborate practical effects.

They also reveal that they learned that each of the three stars built on set weighed a whopping 13,000 pounds!

To read their full list of 30 things they learned on set, click here.

August 28, 2013
Straight from the Set Part 1: Producers Talk Ender’s Game

You are reading Part 1 of a five-part Ender’s Game set report series scheduled for the next week.

As of today, it’s been 464 days since I was on the set of Ender’s Game in New Orleans, Louisiana, staring up at vast green screens and sets in what can only be described as complete and utter awe. Never in the week leading up to that day had I imagined the place I ended up in.

I live in Hawaii, so when my journey began, I was put on a 10 hour direct flight from Honolulu to New Orleans. Seven hours into the flight I was ready to jump out of the plane, but consoled myself with thoughts about what was to come. I met Erin Gross from Ender’s Game Fansite at the airport and we shared a cab to the hotel.

After checking into one of the most gorgeous hotels I’d ever been in, I looked out the window to check out my view, then relaxed until it was time for dinner with Erin. I’d already “known” her by name through our Hunger Games websites, but this was the first time we’d spent some serious time together. It was great to finally talk with someone doing the exact same things that I was doing and who also loved Ender’s Game.

We met up with Kelly from Ender News, who would later become my podcasting partner in crime, and Cassandra from Ender’s Ansible. After a bit of chit chat, we said good night. I tried to prep questions, tried not to get too excited about the next day, and tried the impossible task of falling asleep.

In the morning, we met in the lobby and found a group of other press that would be touring with us including journalists from HitFix, IGN, J-14, and Nerdist. We were given Ender’s Game set badges (which I still have!) and hopped into a van to be driven out to Big Easy Studios at the old NASA Michoud Facility.

Once we got on site, we were taken to the production offices and lead into a conference room wallpapered in concept art and notes. I saw refreshments to the side including my weakness, strawberries, but I was too excited and almost too nauseated to eat. Bob Orci, the producer, was in the room. I’d had no idea he’d be there and being a big fan of a lot of his work, I was more than a little starstruck. Then we sat down and he and fellow producers Lynn Hendee and Linda McDonough proceeded to spew out everything I could have ever wanted to know about the movie they were making.

Ender’s World

Although they hadn’t yet taken us on a tour of anything, the initial producer’s presentation was a gold mine of imagery. If you can recall how long we all have been analyzing and scrutinizing each of the stills and imagery that come out, imagine having 50 of those flash before your eyes in a matter of minutes. I had to force myself not to shriek, “STOP! Go back! I didn’t stare at that one long enough!” Still, Bob Orci continued to flick through them one after another.

An International Fleet school on Earth. Image courtesy of Summit Entertainment.

Even though I’m a longtime fan of Ender’s Game, I admit I never put too much thought into the world that the Wiggins lived in on Earth. Judging from the still above, which Summit provided to us for this report, Ender lives near some type of metropolis. But while in the book, the Wiggins live in the city, that won’t be the case with the film. The Wiggins in the film will live in a home closer to what you may have imagined Bean visits in Shadow of the Hegemon.

“We want[ed] what’s happening on Earth to contrast to the technology of space. So many sci-fi novels present a dystopian future, kind of an ugly place, we wanted to present Ender’s world as one worth saving, one that’s become utopian in many ways.” said Orci. He showed us a slide of a beautiful home with classic columns. “Just like the Vatican is alive and well the way it’s been existing for the last five hundred years here, […] why wouldn’t there be classic houses?”

The Wiggin home is utopian indeed. We were shown photos of Harrison Ford as Colonel Graff and Viola Davis as Major Anderson inside a very picturesque living room, presumably when they’ve come (together, I might add) to take Ender to Battle School. Last month, we actually got to stand in that very same living room at the Ender’s Game Experience at Comic Con.

While a lot of the stills they showed us have been erased from my memory by time, one that managed to stick with me is an overhead shot of Valentine looking up at something with a sad look on her face, presumably at that point Ender is already gone. I can’t remember if it was a mobile or something else, but it could possibly be the plane hanging from the ceiling of his bedroom.

The homes aren’t the only things carrying “classic” themes. At school on Earth, the classrooms are designed after typical science classrooms just like one that you might have learned in yourself. When it comes to Battle School, however, you can see the contrast Orci talks about when you compare the classroom you know with this image (below) of a classroom in Battle School. We also saw a still with Ender facing off against a rather intimidating Stilson.

Some of you may remember we all got to see a photo of Ender’s monitor last year and during the presentation they showed us a photo of Ender sitting on a medical examiner’s table, with some concept art of the utopian society shown on a window behind him.

In the trailer, there’s a shot of a rocket shooting into space and I’m assuming that this is Ender and Graff launching from Earth to go to Battle School. Orci mentioned that they’d started with concept art of a space shuttle taking off like an airplane, but they were promptly shot down by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who they’d been consulting with. “[Musk] said, “No, that would never happen. Since you’re trying to get up, just point the damn thing up.””

Next: Battle School and the Battle Room >>

August 28, 2013
FANSITE EXCLUSIVE: ‘Ender’s Game: Inside the World of an Epic Adventure’

Here’s some seriously cool news for you Launchies! Publisher Insight Editions will be releasing a companion book for the Ender’s Game movie titled Ender’s Game: Inside the World of an Epic Adventure. Your fansites are here to unveil the cover for the new book, due out sometime before the movie’s release!

Read the official description for the book below:

Based on the best-selling novel, Ender’s Game tells the thrilling story of the fight to save the world from a devastating future. Now, in this official companion volume, the behind-the-scenes world of the film is brought into stunning focus.

Following an attack by an alien race known as the Formics—narrowly countered thanks only to the efforts of legendary war hero Mazer Rackham (Ben Kingsley)—Earth has been preparing itself for the next wave in the conflict. The fate of humanity lies in finding the next Mazer from a crop of the brightest young minds on the planet. Under the watchful eye of the International Fleet, the venerated Colonel Hyrum Graff (Harrison Ford) has been tasked with overseeing their training. Before long, a standout emerges among them: Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield), a shy but prodigiously talented misfit. His potential discovered, Ender is promoted to Command School, where he will soon find the war with the Formics to be more complex than he could have ever imagined.

Packed with in-depth interviews, removable posters and army badges, stunning concept art, unparalleled access to the visual effects archives at Digital Domain, and countless full-color images, this insightful insider’s view of the making of Ender’s Game will bring fans closer into the world of the movie, following cast and crew as it is brought to dazzling life.

Also featuring Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit) as Petra Arkanian, Viola Davis (The Help) as Major Gwen Anderson, and Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine) as Ender’s brilliant older sister, Valentine.

Jed Alger is the author of The Art and Making of ParaNorman. An advertising writer and creative director with more than twenty years of experience, he has worked on some of the biggest, most challenging brands in the world—Google, Twitter, IBM, Microsoft, Starbucks, Target, Electronic Arts, and Hewlett-Packard among them. Jed graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in philosophy and received his MFA in creative writing from Columbia University. He lives in Portland, Oregon.

Gavin Hood is a South African filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, and actor, best known for writing and directing the Academy Award–winning foreign language film Tsotsi. He is also the director of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, among several other films.

For those of you that don’t care about spoilers, this sounds like heavenly access to the making of the film. For those of you that are afraid of seeing too much, you may want to buy it and leave it unopened until you see the movie! I know that when the Hunger Games companion books came out people got upset with themselves for not being able to resist looking at all the imagery.

You can pre-order the book on Amazon.com for $32.95 or at Barnes & Noble for $33.61.

Many thanks to Summit for giving us the chance to unveil the cover!

August 27, 2013
Gavin Hood on the Grey Areas of ‘Ender’s Game’

Gavin Hood appeared as a guest at Fan Expo Canada this past weekend and spoke to press about the upcoming Ender’s Game adaptation. In an interview with Metro News, he talks about the difficulties of adapting the book and his interest in the grey areas of the novel.

“Some films masquerade as dealing with moral complexity, but in fact, for me, cop out a little by never putting the protagonist in a truly morally complex situation,” Hood said in a recent interview at the pop culture fest known as Fan Expo Canada. “There are films we can think of where, yes, the protagonist kills people, but actually all the people they kill are bad or awful in some way, (without) that moment of really having to face up to the grey zone, that place where you ask, ‘Am I capable of doing something morally repugnant because I believe it’s for a greater good?’

He also talks a bit about how he sees reactions to his decision to cut Locke and Demosthenes and his wife’s advice on the matter!

“My wife actually says to me, ‘Gavin, you have to stop going on the Internet. It makes you crazy.’ There’s so much chatter,” says Hood. “I found it hard to cut. But it really means you need to make a 15-part miniseries, and I was given the opportunity to make a two-hour film, so my focus was, ‘What can I do in a film that the novel might not be able to do as well?’”

You can read the entire interview at Metro News.

August 26, 2013
Ender’s Game at Toronto’s Fan Expo

Ender’s Game is at Toronto’s Fan Expo Canada this week and eOneFilms (Canadian distributor) is doing the green screen photos for fans that visit their booth. (photo from msnataliedee) If you’re not sure what Fan Expo Canada is, I wasn’t either, but apparently it’s the Canada’s equivalent of Comic Con.

Director Gavin Hood is there and did a press junket for Ender’s Game, so hopefully we’ll see some interviews coming out for that soon. He’s currently doing an autograph signing at the eOneFilms booth. If anyone snaps a photo please send it in to us at valentine @ enderwiggin.net!

August 24, 2013
Ender’s Game Toon Leader T-Shirt

Those of you that love t-shirts might be interested in this unofficial Toon Leader t-shirt from Sun Frog Shirts:

The shirt sells for $19, not including shipping. Buy it here.

August 24, 2013