Set Visit Report #5 - Stunt Coordinator Garrett Warren

Garrett Warren's eye patch is a funny thing: It's the first thing you notice when you meet him, but the last thing you think about after you've been around him for just a few minutes.

Garrett Warren and Jimmy Jax Pinchak

The Ender's Game stunt coordinator, known for his work on Avatar, Alice in Wonderland, and all three Transformers films, is one of the most sought-after men in Hollywood. He recently wrapped on the highly-anticipated Divergent in Chicago but when we first met him last July he was still null-gravity focused, all grins and a big booming voice that surely came in handy when trying to wrangle teenagers for scenes in the Battle Room.

Warren first read Ender's Game when his then 11-year-old daughter was assigned the book for school. "And the only reason why I read it was because I thought it was a really cool cover when I saw it," he told us, with a slight grin. "I have read Twilight, you know, she was reading Twilight for school, and she read The Hunger Games. So, I mean, I do fancy the idea that what she's reading... I'd like to know what she's reading."

"It has some really important lessons to be learned about growing up in the future, which I believe we are doing right now. I love the idea of the whole philosophy of war, and I think that was something that I learned at a later age when I was a fighter - I was a professional fighter - and I read the book Sun Tzu, The Art of War, which is of course required reading for an awful lot of business people in the world. [...] It's incredibly valuable to children as well as adults, so I liked that."

And it was his appreciation for Ender's story that made signing on to this project such a joy for Warren. "I've worked on some great films in my past, I really have," he nodded. "My career is fruitful, and I've worked on some things that are technically groundbreaking. This one's different. This one's amazing."

A Young Cast

Working on a movie with a primary location that is essentially a boarding school in space, the stunt coordinator had to work with a lot of young actors who had school, time limitations and bad days, but he found out that the cast was very eager to practice and rehearse, and in the end their flying skills far exceeded his expectations.

"When we first walked into this show, we pretty much go by the same limitations we always have with kids, and that is no kid should be in a wire for more than five minutes at a time, no more than thirty minutes of training a day, etc. [...] I have to admit, the kids did not want to get out of the wires. They had an awful lot of fun. They would find themselves time while they were doing shots to run over to where we were with our wires and jump in for rehearsals. So as far as our limitations, we really didn't have an awful lot of limitations. I'm very fortunate in saying this, because by the end of their training period, they were all very proficient at flying in these wires. They did it all themselves. So I can't tell you how excited I am for the world to see these kids actually doing their own movements, their own choreography, their own stunts, and their own action."

One day, he said, a couple of the boys became so capable that they were out-performing some of the professional  performers they had hired to help with stunts.

"That was Moises. As well as Aramis. I have to admit, Aramis grew to become amazing in a wire. Aramis was the showboat in a wire. Moises was the guy that would make you look at him and go, oh my gosh, he's weightless. He was able to animate his body so perfectly and show no pendulum or break in his core stability that you would think he's weightless. Aramis was the kind of guy that wanted to flip and fly and bounce off walls, and Moises just wanted to fool the world and make them believe, and he did. He was beautiful, the way he flew weightless. Everyone else did great."

"I can tell you that there was nobody that was bad in the wire; however, it took some people longer than others to try to get there. And let me tell you, we had Cirque du Soleil performers as their stunt doubles, but really I think that the job of the stunt people we had as their doubles was only to be their teachers, because they really didn't do the stunts for the movie. They were only there to basically make sure the harnesses were attached properly and then between shots they flew up and they went, ‘That was great, just animate your hand a little bit more like this,' and then that was all they would do. All the kids did it themselves; it was really good."

Training

Most of the kids walked on the set having never before been challenged in such a physical way, so before they were allowed on the wires, they had to undergo weeks of training, boot camp, and calisthenics to build arm and stomach muscles, as well as close-quarter combat training where they had to learn to "dismantle a person basically with their hands."

Space Camp © Summit Entertainment

"This is the greatest training I have seen in my life and been a part of in my experience as a filmmaker," Warren admitted, "The other training was wires. They were in wires for anywhere from thirty minutes to three hours. They were doing push-ups, calisthenics, they were doing core stability exercises with straps... It was some of the best training I've seen in my life, and the apparatus that we have was an apparatus that hasn't been used in this way in the movie industry before, so it's incredibly difficult. You have to have incredible stomach muscles and lower back muscles to be able to use this piece of equipment that we developed for this movie. And so all the kids when they first got in here were just dying, you know - 'Oh my gosh, this is so hard, it's hurting my back, ahh!' And by the end of about six or seven days, they were all brave. No complaints, they were all 100% ready to do whatever the stunt wants them to do."

They didn't just put the kids on wires to simulate null gravity -- they also developed something completely new which Warren described as the "closest thing to weightlessness you will ever be able to experience on this world." He called it a lollipop, a wire hung on an arm. The actor could be placed in a teetering ring which they could fly around the facility - anywhere they wanted, as far as a football stadium.

"While they're in it, they are able to manipulate themselves. Not someone else on a wire, pulling and tossing, no. They're able to touch something and float away. And they're able to spin around, and they have no wires associated with their bodies as well. And then we put air pumps on anything, so it was like an air hockey game. We were able to move this big huge crane arm that has them on this ring as well around the whole floor."

The Shower Scene

"There's a fight scene in there that I'm incredibly impressed with and proud of. And it's going on my radar," Warren admitted later, surprised when we all jumped to ask more. "Oh, you know the whole shower scene? How'd you know about the shower scene?"

How, indeed.

© Garrett Warren

"I have to admit, aside from the fact that it was a group attack, um... And I'm not going to give you guys anything to spoil, because I really do want you guys to see it in its entirety the way it's done. I think that it's a scene, it's filmed so well. Gavin did such a great job, and Asa and Moises did such an amazing job, that it goes down in the annals of history as a fight sequence that many people will copy, I think, for years to come.  Aside from the fact that they were kids, you know, put that aside, and it's a really good sequence. Your chops will be salivating the whole time watching this scene from beginning to ending, the way that it's drawn out, the way that it's transpired, it's really accurate, the way it's shot - beautiful shots, composed so well, cinematography."

The scene will also use movements taken from aikido, a Japanese form of self-defense and martial art that "employs holds and locks and that uses the principles of nonresistance in order to debilitate the strength of the opponent."

"It's learning how to make more or brush off you instead of smacking. It's learning how to take someone's weight and their momentum and use it against them," Warren explained. "It's constantly seeing someone, figuring out where their weaknesses were, and utilizing that against them. My hat's off to Gavin for wanting to use that for fight scenes."

He was as passionate about the project as we were and we could have chatted all day, but we unfortunately had to wrap before any of us were ready. It was time to explore sets, play with props, and chat with the cast -- a cast made up of a group of young actors Garrett Warren had become very fond of. 

"I think more important than anything was the fact that these are possibly the greatest kids I've ever worked with in my life in the film industry, and I'm not just saying that to be hopefully in your blog," he laughed, and so did we, but it was clear that he meant every word.  "I honestly believe that these are the greatest kids I've ever worked with, so my hat's off to Gavin for his casting process, and my hat's off to the producers for finding these kids because these kids are the next greats in Hollywood. And I'm telling you, whether it be the Al Pacinos or the Robert De Niros or the Natalie Portmans, they are IT. It's really good. So it's not just watching a kid run and jump and do something on-screen. These kids deliver dialogue. These kids..."

Set Visit #4: The Cast Talks Stunts, Buggers, and Pop Tarts

"We're open for questions. Are you game?"

We had been ushered by the producers into a trailer that had been set up in simple press conference style -- a bunch of folding chairs facing a long table where the talent would be sitting. Hailee Steinfeld and Asa Butterfield had entered the room after a few minutes of us chatting aimlessly and flipping through notes, both still in costume: dark turtlenecks, long pants, and the black tactical boots we've seen so often in the film's trailers. I felt terrible for them as May in New Orleans is scorching, but the room was cool and they seemed comfortable -- or, at the very least, resigned to the decidedly unglamorous life on a movie set.

Making use of the short time we knew we had with the pair before they would be called back to filming, the first question was launched and off we went.

Hailee couldn't quite remember how she initially became involved in the Ender's Game project. She had been in the middle of another film when she found out about the role and a few phone calls were made. While the then 15-year-old actress was too soft-spoken and sweet to admit that everyone was probably thrilled to hear that her Oscar-nominated self was interested in the project,  it's easy to imagine casting the character of Petra went very much like this:

"Hello, this is Hailee Steinfeld's rep…"
"Yes."

While no one can doubt his acting chops, London-born Asa Butterfield had a tougher time of it as he had to prove he could pick up a generic American accent.

© Summit Entertainment

"I sent off a lot of audition tapes. And the harder part of it was of course getting into the accent so I did a lot of dialect training. And once I sent off a few tapes, I ended up meeting Gavin in L.A. where I spoke to him and I performed in front of him. And I don't remember how long after that it was, it was during the press tour for Hugo, and my mom told me that I got the part."

And how did he react?

"Well actually, it was just before our flight out to New York to start everything and my mom came into my bedroom and... okay, this is pretty much word for word... she was like, 'Okay, take a deep breath.' And as soon as she said that, I knew what had happened. I literally screamed. Like, I was flipping out. It was amazing," Asa grinned.

While neither Hailee nor Asa had read the book before they'd began the audition process, they both picked it up quickly after booking their roles. We asked Hailee if she found the Petra of the film to be similar to the author's version of the girl with "more balls than anyone else" in Salamander Army and she immediately insisted that she was.

"It's very similar. I mean, the movie is as close to the book as a two-hour movie can get. But for my character I love, you know -- Petra, she's a very strong independent girl and I love that. [...] When I first read a character, if it's a strong female role then that's kind of a part for me."

"The book really helped with the background for Ender, the whole thing about his family and... so that was really helpful," Asa remarked. "And there is a lot, sort of, on Wikipedia about the past and all of the law to the Hegemon and the Strategos, so that was all really helpful."

The Hamster Wheel

When the topic of stunts came up, Asa and Hailee told us a bit more about something we'd been allowed to peek at during the production art tour: the hamster wheel. In the video we'd seen, the two of them were strapped face-to-face in a spinning device, flipping over and over at a speed that would have made the most seasoned stuntman nervous.

"It felt a lot faster than it looked," Asa insisted. "It might have been going really slow but we were travelling a hundred miles an hour."

"It's really funny," laughed Hailee, "Because I mean, working with the stunt coordinator, Garrett Warren, it's been... he's so passionate about what he does and it makes it that much more fun for us. You know, he has something new he's like, 'Hey guys, let's check this out, let's try this!' and if something doesn't work he's like 'Forget it, let's do something else' and he's, you know, always up for new things and new challenges but um... the hamster wheel is one that we did where, I mean, we couldn't even look at each other with a straight face 'cause our helmets were super tight and once we were upside down it like kind of…"

"Made us look… sort of hamsterish. Hence the name."

Since most of us were there representing one fan outlet or another, we asked Asa and Hailee if it was more difficult working on a movie that has such a huge fanbase -- does it put pressure on them in any way? Surprisingly, neither of them thought it did.

"I don't feel that, personally," Hailee explained, pausing a moment. "I think, speaking for myself and I think the others could agree, coming onto a project that does have such a huge fanbase that, you know, I found that I'm a fan of it in general... kind of coming on and being able to be a part of it is just kind of an honor rather than feeling the pressure of it."

Asa definitely agreed. "Yeah, I mean, totally. It's an amazing opportunity to be on this and it's been an amazing experience. But there is a massive fan base for this and, well, as soon as I got the part one of the things I told my mom was... one of the main scenes I want to do in this is still appeal to the massive cult that already follows Ender's Game and so... that was what I was thinking about when I was doing the role."

Before we had stopped in to chat with the cast, we were speaking to stunt director Garrett Warren -- in an interview you'll read tomorrow -- and he had gushed excitedly over the infamous shower scene. When asked, Asa admitted it's going to be pretty epic.

"It was intense. It's an amazing scene, from what I've seen of it at least. And yeah, it was one of the first scenes I had filmed with Moises and we were both really excited about it. Like at the hotel we both were like wondering, 'Am I going to do a back flip over you or something?' And of course it was more realistic than that but we had our fantasies about how epic it would be. And of course there's the part about … it was difficult to shoot because they could never show me naked, so they had to always shoot me from the waist up. But yeah, it was an amazing scene."

--

Gavin Hood's arrival signaled a change in conversation and a few minutes later, both Asa and Hailee were called back to set and a troop of boys wandered in: Suraj Partha, Conor Carroll, Khylin Rhambo, Aramis Knight -- with a guest appearance by Stilson actor Caleb Thaggard.

The first question for the group was well-suited to a bunch of teenage boys growing up in the 21st century: What piece of advanced technology used in Ender's futuristic world would they love to see available today?

"I think the little mouse for our computers that we saw today," Aramis pipped up. "They are incredible. It's cool how just a little device this big... they compacted the keyboard into it and the little scrolly thing and the joystick. It's so cool."

Khylin went for a more obvious choice: the flash gun.

"You'd need the flash SUIT with that, too."

"Ah yeah, that's true," Khylin winced.

Set Shenanigans

Throw together scores of teenagers, long days, and a dash of Gavin Hood and you are sure to occasionally run into mischief. And when we asked the boys if there had been any silly moments on set, they definitely did not disappoint.

© Ender News

"I know a really good one," grinned Conor. "This is a really long story but I'll try to keep it short. It was doing one scene where I think Ender enters the battle and Fly falls off and breaks his leg. And it was this one person who works on the movie's birthday and I don't know why but he dressed up like an enormous bunny. And so Gavin said, 'Okay, great, nice shot everyone. Let's do one more take.' So we were all like getting ready and the man in the bunny suit came in, 'All right everyone, time to go into space!' Everyone laughed so unbelievably hard."

"That was a good one," Aramis agreed. "I was like, 'Should I go with it?'"

"Donnie Darko. You guys can see him too, right?"

What about when they weren't filming or in between takes?

"I've been learning how to beat-box from Asa," grinned Suraj.

"And he's RIDICULOUS at it," Aramis assured us. "I've been teaching these guys a little bit about basketball. We've been doing that a little bit."

But not everything they did between takes was just for fun - they also admitted that they liked to spend time getting revved up and ready for Battle as a group and had come up with a way to really get blood flowing.

"Yeah, when we gotta get pumped, ready for battle, right before they say "action!" we start doing chants and we're like stomping. It's like a football team," Khylin nodded. "It's super cool though, it gets you in the moment."

Stunts

Once the boys were pumped and ready to go, the real work started. Who needs stunt doubles when you have a bunch of young, energetic teenagers to work with? It was really surprising to hear from the cast how many of the stunts they actually pulled off on their own - and of course they all had their favorites.

© Summit Entertainment

Khylin loved the first time they got to run and jump into the Battle Room. They put the boys on a zip line and told them to go for it. "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's easy to imagine the actors zipping down the huge hall at the old NASA facility, each trying to outdo the other and come up with the most outrageous null-gravity move.

"I know one scene that… Bean definitely knows this... and it's probably one of his and one of my favorite scenes, too," Conor leaned over to gesture at Aramis a few seats away. "We were on the zipline and he's laying face-down on one of the windows looking out and I grab his leg and he kicks me and I have to do a couple somersaults in space. It was one of the hardest scenes I had ever done cause like my gun kept dropping or I didn't spin enough times or I spun to the side."

"And I told him if I had any anger towards him, I was going to let it out in that scene. I really went for it. I kicked him, I kicked him. It felt really great," Aramis grinned.

But what about Stilson? Did Caleb Thaggard get to try out any of the wirework even though his character never quite makes it to Battle School?

"Well, with these guys telling me how much those things hurt, I really didn't…" he admitted as the room exploded in laughter. "'You wanna try??' 'No, no I'm fine, man. I'll be an Earth brat. I'm good. I'm chillin' on Earth.' But yeah, it was still really, really fun."

© Summit Entertainment

While Caleb wasn't required to strap himself into a harness and pretend to be weightless, he did have to go through a bit of the martial arts and military training. Why? As we saw last week in a newly released still, Ender's school on Earth is run by the International Fleet.

"I got to do some of that. I have a new respect for every single one of them. The stuff they had to do every day... cause, you know, at first I only had to do like marching and you know, if I messed up with that, all I had to do was push-ups. These dudes had to do push-ups, sit-ups, sparring. I was like, 'All right, yeah, you guys are beastly.'"

The Buggers

So, Battle School is breath-taking and the null-gravity stunt work should be incredible. But there's one question that's still on everyone's mind: What do the Formics look like? It appears the studio wants to leave this reveal for the big screen;  there hasn't been any sign of the aliens in the trailers and it's very unlikely they come out with a Bugger Drone #24 character poster before the film hits theaters in November.

They did, however, give us a peak at the Formic imagery last May and the Buggers were impressive -- and terrifying. But what did the boys think the first time they had a chance to check them out?

"The first time I think all of us saw them, it was just a picture, right? They just look like really giant ants." Aramis explained, using his hands to to give us a better visual. "Giant ants with claws and teeth and it shows like everything, like the science, crazy names on all of them, the anatomy, muscular system. It's crazy."

"I had two impressions when I first saw them. The first was, 'Oh my god, I can't believe they look like this!' I always thought they were like humanoid, almost. Like they'd walk on two legs. My second thought was, 'I don't wanna be one of them cause I'd have to be with other Formics all the time,' Conor admitted, to huge laughter and agreement from his castmates. "That's like another reason why I don't want to be like... a spider or something, being around spiders all the time."

Suraj, however, pointed out that the Formics weren't entirely frightening. "I think the artists have done a good job, though, of... I mean, there is sort of a beauty to them as well. 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."

"The Formics are supposed to be this intelligent adversary," Caleb agreed, "One of the things I think they did with the design was really... the facial structure itself kind of had expression and an intelligence to it. So you were like, 'Yeah, okay, I could see how this thing would kick our butts in a space battle.' They just looked advanced, look like a threat."

Flash Suits

When we asked the boys about their favorite costume, there was a bit of confusion on our side of the room. Several of the boys shuffled a bit in their seats and at least one of them winced.

© Ender News

"Favorite looking?" Suraj tentatively asked.

"Yeah, my favorite looking is the flash suits," Khylin said, to the agreement of his friends.

It was when we asked if the suits were comfortable that we found out why they acting strangely. No. No, they were not.

"I'm glad we said favorite looking," Aramis shot at Khylin, who grinned and replied, "My favorite one is the pajamas."

Suraj laughed. "Yeah, the flash suits were definitely... they looked really good on camera. And one of the funniest things is that in the dormitories we have all the flash suits and everything. We're supposed to get dressed really quickly and run over to the Battle Room. And 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…"

"IT DOESN'T FIT, IT DOESN'T. NEW ZIPPER, NEW ZIPPER," Aramis reenacted. "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.' Because, 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."

In our interview with costume designer Christine Bieselin Clark which we released Friday, she admitted that they had fashioned the flash suits with wiggle room so that the actors could grow and not necessarily need a new one. But with all the working-out they were doing, the form-fitted suits did occasionally get a bit snug.

"When we got our fitting, they measured us and everything and then it fit me perfectly. And then once we went to training doing like push-ups and sit-ups and stuff, I'd put it on, the same suit, and I almost fainted. It felt like I was getting hugged by Nonso!" Khylin laughed. "It was crazy tight, but it got so much better after they tailored it. And it wasn't as bad as we were making it sound. It's definitely going to look really good on camera."

Pop Tarts

The conversation had slowly begun to dwindle at this point. The boys praised Moises Arias's intense work-out ethic, Nonso laughingly explained why yelling at the kids was a fun sort of therapy for him, and Khylin gave us the low-down on his new show, The First Family. There was a long pause, and I jokingly, brought the conversation back around to something we had been talking about earlier with the producers.

"We're going to start talking about Pop Tarts again in a minute."

"You guys talked about Pop Tarts? Where was I?"

"What? I love Pop Tarts."

"The strawberry kind with like the frosting and the …"

"I have a whole life story on Pop Tarts. At home there are these Pop Tarts and they are blue and drizzled with purple and they're like Wild Berry. At home, they don't make them! They don't make them in LA."

Check out the Pop Tart audio below:



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Coming tomorrow: Interview with stunt coordinator Garrett Warren, the set designers, and Sir Ben Kingsley!

Set Visit: 20 Exciting Props From the "Ender's Game" Movie

Last May, prop master Don Miloyevich gave us a detailed run down on all the Ender's Game props - and some really interesting tidbits about their use in the film.

Here's fun fact #1: Theresa Wiggin, Ender's mother, tries to send her son away to Battle School with his grandfather's St. Christopher medal, but Graff refuses to let him take it with him. No personal items are allowed as they don't want the students to have even more reasons to become homesick.

But if they're not allowed personal items, how exactly do they play baseball in the space station?

© Summit Entertainment

They used a plastic tube they had found and some rolled up socks! Makes whoever caught the ball look a little less impressive, doesn't it?

Here's the prop rundown!

Desk Pad: The desk is used by the students in Battle School for homework, research, and a trip into the school's psychological evaluation program, the Mind Game - though the props themselves are not actual computers. They used different gels on the screens to indicate what the kids are supposed to be working on in the scene, plus a simple blue screen when the VFX team needed to add in visuals later. It also comes with a storage bag!

"Sold separately," Bob Orci winked.

Monitor: This was an actual prop, not just digitally added-in as most probably imagined. Miloyevich pointed out where the monitor would light up in a pale blue ring. To remove the monitor, a German surgical robot opens it up and yanks it out of the back of his neck and essentially his brainstem. Yikes!

Bugger Mask: Peter makes Ender put on this mask at the Wiggin family home and uses the "Buggers and Astronauts" game as an excuse to beat up his little brother on a regular basis.

Cubify 3d Printer used in Ender's Game

Cubify 3D Printer: This printer, designed by 3D Systems, is making its cinematic debut in the Ender's Game film. It was also featured at the end of the experience at Comic-Con.

Space Ship and Mobile: These were both designed using the 3D printer mentioned above -- a Formic space ship and a mobile which depict's Mazer's battle with the Formics.

It's easy imagine why these would be attractive for young kids of the time period to hang in their rooms.


Zero-G Barf Bag: "He then makes his way to battle school where someone throws up and we have our Zero G barf bags." We now know that this was Alai played by Suraj Partha -- his barf bag was featured in the Ender's Game experience!

Flash gun © Ender News

Flash Guns: "It takes a couple seconds for them to charge up and then you hit where the hammer would be for them to flash -- and of course digitally they will add in a nice electron particle beam."

---> Fun Fact #2: We found out that Salamander Army plays a dorm game with the flash gun. The gun is made out of ten different pieces, and all the soldiers have a contest to see who can take it apart and put it back together again the fastest. Some of the kids got really good at it!

The Hook: Graff uses this device to pull the kids in from Zero-G. He simply waves them in or out of the Battle Room with a short arm movement.

Petra's Target Balls: She uses these in a Battle Room practice session to teach Ender how to "shoot straight." After tossing them out into the room, they digitally expand and light up when you hit them.

I.F. Rings: All the big International Fleet "swells" wore I.F. rings to inflate their already humongous egos.

Grooming Kit: A prop which Asa Butterfield was allowed to keep, this box was stored in their lockers and filled with "the most interesting stuff [they] could find" -- a bit more exciting than toothbrushes, we're guessing.

Pneumatic Injection Gun: This absolutely terrifying gun is used in a scene in which Ender is very upset and needs to be sedated. We bet you can imagine which scene we're talking about!

© Summit Entertainment

Virtual Reality Helmets: Also used for the drone operators, these helmets are worn by the young cadets in the film -- their faces were digitally replaced in post-production.

Oxygen Tank: There's not much oxygen on Eros, so these are used whenever the cadets and I.F. personell need to journey outside. Ender also uses this tank later for another purpose -- but you'll have to wait for the film to find out what!

Kris Vector: "A .45 caliber. Basically what we couldn’t make we tried to find what was the newest thing on the market, what was in prototype, what people mostly haven’t seen before."

G Suit and Vest: Made originally for the Joint Strike Fighter, the suit and vest were on loan from the manufacture.

Gentex Helmet: Super fancy helmet by GenTtx! Through head-mounted displays actually in the helmet, pilots can now track things using only their eyes as well as target multiple targets. Also includes night-vision!

Wrist-worn Computers: Another prop used in the film after a search for new products on the market.

Raft: Okay, so we didn't actually get to SEE this but Don Miloyevich mentioned that it was sitting out in the parking lot. As we all know, it was used in the scene when Ender meets Valentine after heading back to Earth.

--> Fun Fact #3: In the film, this lakehouse seems to be called the veterans' retreat, a place for retired soldiers or people who have possibly been injured and quit the program, a bit of speculation backed-up by Milovevich's comment, "We had some great exo-skeletons and bionic arms, fancy wheelchairs for the people that were in the scene there."

The raft, you guys. It was just out in the parking lot. Does anyone want to go see if it's still there?

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Don't forget to also check out today's interview with costume designer Christine Bieselin Clark!

Coming Monday: Press conference interview with the cast

Set Visit #3 - Costume Designer Christine Bieselin Clark

If you were to ask the young cast members what their favorite costume was in Ender's Game, a lot of them would most likely say the pajamas.

"Those kids!" laughed Clark. "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. They were like, 'We don't have to wear our flash suits anymore, yes!'"

It makes you really feel for them.

Flash Suits

During our visit to the set in May of last year, Ender's Game costume designer Christine Bieselin Clark invited us into her office. After dodging some interns pushing carts of flight suits, we ascended some stairs and entered a room that was wall-to-wall headshots, army badges, and flash suits propped up in random corners. Little notes accompanied many of the pictures: "Kyle Clements, young Mazer Rackham" or "Payton Bourgeois, Eros, Sim Group A."

It's not hard to imagine the first thing we discussed.

The flash suits were created, as last year's production blog put it, "entirely out of thin air." The fabric was also original, designed by the film's production team to create something functional yet futuristic. The team worked hard to imagine a suit that would look sleek and attractive yet would still allow the young actors to move fluidly in a simulated null-G environment.

And then they had to tackle another problem: Asa Butterfield's growth spurt. How did they deal with the issue of scores of teenagers growing out of their flash suits?

"The suit is designed in two pieces and the design of the pants extends up underneath the jacket. So if you start growing and your jacket starts creeping up there is still something going on there. And the way the boots overlay the pant leg and the gloves the arm, it was all designed that so if we had those fluctuations we could make concessions for them quickly instead of, 'Oh my God, we have to make Asa a new flash suit. For tomorrow.' That would have been awful."

They ended up constructing around 78 flash suit helmets for the film, all custom-fit to the principle actors and complete with built-in fans to to keep the kids from overheating. Since the fans created noise that sometimes disrupted filming, they could be turned off and on as needed by a remote-control device the production team carried around. "It was like a key ring with a bunch of car clickers on it," Clark smiled. "We'd walk around, and everyone had a little label on there so we knew who we were able to turn on and off."

© Summit Entertainment

The helmets were designed in 3 parts: the  base, the visor, and the mandible. All fitting together magnetically, they were designed to be taken apart and worn with or without the visor as the reflections would sometimes interfere with CGI and camera work. On the back of the helmets you can spot the individual army's insignia -- which will look multidimensional on the big screen but is really just a sticker.

"They are decals actually," revealed Clark. "We painted the whole helmet and then we did this clear decal, but again, because you don't want it to seem flat or boring, we did 12 ink passes on the emblem so that it stood up slightly." However, we won't be seeing all 8 army insignia on flash suits in the film; only 4 versions of army flash suits were actually created to be used in Battle Room scenes.

"They all were exactly the same look, we just created different armor and helmets to represent the teams. You didn't want that feeling of something being so cute, you know, 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.

When it came to actually choosing the colors for the different armies, Clark and the production team used the concept of "dusty jewels" -- deep, vibrant tones muted slightly by a layer of grey, or "dust." The identifying colors were added sparingly to the helmets and suits to help distinguish the individual armies in the Battle Room without distracting the audience with color.

Military Uniforms

To create a timeless and decidedly un-American uniform for the International Fleet, Clark looked to military uniforms throughout history from countries all over the world. They wanted simple, clean style lines and mixed together pieces from different time periods to create something future-forward.

"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 to create something that your mind would say, 'Oh, that's the future, but it's identifiable in some way.'"

But even though it's the future, they didn't want the suits to be flashy.

"Gavin's idea from the beginning was that the costumes really shouldn't jump out at you - they have to kind of be the backdrop for the faces and the performances, so there's a lot of subtlety in the things that we did."

© Ender News

Some of you eagle-eyed fans might have noticed a while back that each of the flight suits and BDUs (Battle Dress Uniforms) carry a name tag with the character's last name in braille. What you might not have known is that the braille is not embossed -- it's debossed, or inverted.

"We created a dot matrix code, and we used that as a point of reference, so it was really..." Clark paused. "We wanted to have something that, again, doesn't apply to something now but is still grounded in some kind of reality. So we wanted to use a dot pattern instead of a bar code, so it was scannable, but not the way that we would scan things now."

Females in Battle School

It's already very noticeable that the Battle School of the film admits far more girls than were admitted in the book. Since a lot of the movie is set at a military academy, did Clark have to make effort to make sure they didn't sexualize the female characters?

"Absolutely," Clark agreed instantly.  "Especially with Valentine, because you want that relationship to be a very pure emotional relationship, but if Valentine starts seeming sexy in some way, you just mess the whole thing up. You want people to watch the characters and see the innocence of these kids for who they were in that moment so that their humanity is present. So you identify with them as young people instead of sexualized people. You want her to be adorable, loving and charming instead of like 'Ooh, doesn't Valentine look hot?' And I mean they're attractive and I'm sure that there will be plenty of fans who are like 'Petra looked hot!' but not because we overtly did that to her."

We hung out a little while after the interview, chatting about stuff on her walls and how the army badges would be excellent for merchandizing. Everyone agreed that temporary tattoos would be a big hit and Clark joked about contacting "the Happy Meal people" as we were walking out the door for our tour of the props.

But wait! What about the Formics?

"I am not costuming an alien in this movie. That is my final answer."

Producer Bob Orci looked up from his phone. "What?"

"I have not put a costume on an alien."

"No, no, cause we wanted the aliens sexualized.

"The plunging neckline! We’re working on that."

--
Don't forget to also check out today's report on the 20 Exciting Props From the Ender's Game Movie!

Coming Monday: Press conference interview with the cast!

Set Visit Report #2: Interview With Director Gavin Hood

© Ender News

As far as directors go, Gavin Hood seems to be the perfect choice for a film which requires working with a fleet of young actors. He's the kind of guy who could be your neighbor, one who'd play soccer with your kid and grin winningly from the ground after he tripped over his own feet. I've heard him described by those who spent time on the Ender's Game set as a "grown-up kid" and "our very own Peter Pan." He's likable, unassuming, and has a charming tendency to throw his hands up in the air when he's talking.

He is also a man filled with a deep passion for his work and an understanding of film adaptations that comes not only from him being a brilliant director and scriptwriter, which he is, but because he is first and foremost a fan of the material. And it's his fan side that seems to be what fuels his desire to get Ender's Game right, not just for box office numbers -- but for us.

On the day of our set visit, he snuck quietly into the press conference toward the end of our talk with a few of the film's stars, Asa Butterfield, Hailee Steinfeld, and Nonso Anozie. He looked a little like he wasn't quite meant to be there, standing smiling off to the side of the room while Asa told of his first meeting with Orson Scott Card, admitting that he hadn't had many questions for the author; it was Card, rather, who had the questions for him.

"He hasn't read his books for a long time. He was checking with the kids," Hood quipped, to roaring laughter.

"Gavin Hood, everyone."

© Summit Entertainment

The first question everyone saw coming: What's Hood's favorite sci-fi film? Unsurprisingly, it's 2001 A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick, a film which he claims influenced his decision to direct Ender's Game.

"I've always been a big fan of Kubrick, and on some level, that's what attracted me to this movie. You have these amazing visual opportunities that are big and epic and beautiful -- and you're in space. It's literally awe-inspiring. And if you watch, if you spend a lot of time watching footage that's been shot on the Hubble telescope, you get all those fantastic, big visuals. And of course there is the Battle Room and they do all this wonderful stuff - you're in the Battle School and you get all this zero-gravity stuff at the same time."

He could have probably talked Kubrick forever, and to be honest, we would have let him. However, it was then that several of the supporting cast members popped in -- Ender's jeesh.

"Come on, you are all kids," he grinned. "This is much more important."

After a lot of laughing and rearranging of the seats, the cast gathered around their director and Nonso Anozie brought us back to the topic at hand.

Physical Sets vs. CGI

"You know what's amazing? When you say 2001 A Space Odyssey, a lot of the sets, a lot of stuff which surprised me coming onto this film, are real built sets. They're real. 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," Anozie admitted. "And kind of that James Cameron/Kubrick-kind of feel, that symmetry? It's like a lot of that beauty is captured sometimes in this film, in some of the stuff we do."

"And that's really the key," Hood agreed. "You have both these awe-inspiring, epic moments and you have these very intimate close-ups, detailed emotional moments, what's going on between the characters. Which I think is what's amazing about Ender's Game. It's really a fantastic set of characters. It's obviously a single wonderful character study of Ender but he's also surrounded by amazing characters like Bean, and Dink, and Alai, and Bernard, and obviously Petra. [...] You've got all these marvelous, strong, well-defined characters engaged in really human and emotional stories. And yet it's set in this wonderful, sort of epic space."

© Summit Entertainment

It really is an epic space, as we would witness all day while wandering around the sets -- huge set pieces which were built to scale there at the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, including the cavernous room of Ender's final simulation. And when walking down the Formic tunnels, amber pathways with metal walkways bolted in, it wasn't hard to understand how easy it would have been for the actors to become lost in the world of Eros.

"What we wanted to create were spaces where the actors could genuinely feel the world. And then obviously there are certain worlds, like when you really are out in space, that have to be fully visually created by us. But certainly when you're in the space tunnels and in the dormitories and moving down those corridors or inside the command center on Eros..." he drifted off, possibly a little lost in Ender's world himself.

© Summit Entertainment

But what about the set pieces which couldn't be realistically built? Gavin spent some time explaining exactly how he and the VFX team went about filming scenes which were very greenscreen-heavy, such as those which take place in the Battle Room or the Mind Game. Bringing a beloved character to life is daunting enough as it is; how did Asa manage to interact with characters and objects he couldn't see?

The team made it a bit easier for him: before Asa was expected to perform, he was shown a previsualization of how everything should eventually play out. After spending quite some time working with movement coaches, he then tried out what he had learned based on what the scene was tentatively supposed to look like.

Fortunately for Asa, it wasn't necessary for him to base his actions on what the visual team expected; rather, they added in the visuals based on where he grabbed, reached, and moved.

"If he reaches here and pulls something here or he reaches slightly off there, it's fine because we're putting in those graphics certainly in relation to what we see on him. [...] 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."

But it would be.

Themes of Leadership

Gavin Hood was drafted into the military at the age of 17, and it was his time spent in service which he says helped him connect emotionally to Ender's story.

"A lot of those feelings - feeling like you were just a number in an organization with strong authority figures that you were not supposed to question, feeling like you wanted to rebel against it… I connected with this book in many ways based on feelings and experiences that I'd had. And I also really think that the ideas and themes of leadership in the book and hopefully in the movie are timeless and classic. You know, what is good leadership? What is bad leadership? What is responsible leadership?"

These are themes which Hood feels are important to address with young people today. And what's a better platform for reaching teenagers than a huge Hollywood blockbuster?

"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, but 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. We can combine spectacle with a good old-fashioned argument afterwards and that's kind of fun."

Book Adaptations and Locke and Demosthenes

One complaint heard most often from fans is that the Locke and Demosthenes storyline has been cut from the film. In what might have been my favorite part of the set visit, Gavin Hood addressed this question and the challenge that inevitably awaits every book-to-movie adaptation.

"The film making experience is very different to reading a book. It is a contained 2 hour experience in which you have a beginning, a middle and an end and you leave before your bladder hurts," he stated, grinning. "These are the facts, right? The medium is different. And one of the facts I think we have to own up to is that saying, 'Is the movie like the book?' Wait a minute, the book is the book. It exists, it can never be taken away. It is a different experience to sit and read over a period of weeks or days, chapter by chapter, put it down, reflect, pick it up. So that is why movies are based on books. They cannot be the book."

At this point, everyone in the room was nodding, including the boys sitting around him. Everyone could tell that this was a conversation they'd had many times and a topic which Hood had given a great deal of thought. He gestured to Alai actor Suraj Partha who was sitting to his right.

"If I said to you, 'Here is a young Suraj. I want you to take his photograph and I'd like you to sculpt him, I'd like you to paint him in oil.' And these 3 pieces of art were presented to the class. Would the class say, 'Hold on, this oil painting looks nothing like the sculpture!' You'd go, 'Of course it doesn't. That's an oil painting and that's a sculpture.'

"So the question becomes: Does the oil painting capture the spirit of this boy in some unique way? Does the 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, I did it with Tsotsi - it was an adaptation in which I made many changes -- and Athol [Fugard] was very pleased with it. He said, 'Because you stayed true to the spirit of the character.'"

© Summit Entertainment

But if Locke and Demosthenes are cut from the film, how is Hood going to reveal Peter's depth, his better qualities? How will we ever relate to a boy who is found skinning squirrels alive halfway through the novel?

"I've tried to do it without giving it away, and had to do it in a matter of about 3 very economical scenes," he replied. "We meet Peter at the beginning of the movie, and he has everything I think that the book has - that aggression and bully and nastiness. But to your point, if you had interviewed Peter and said, 'Why are you doing this?' he would say, 'Because this kid has to toughen up or he's not going to make it.' He's engaged in what he would justify as tough love. And at some point in the film, somewhere in the third act, you will find a scene in which that idea presents itself. [...] I've tried to do it in a very subtle scene between him and Valentine which is not a scene from the book."

The door opened then and the director was called back to set, but he took a moment to turn and thank us all for being there. "I love these questions because they’re so tough to answer but they're so honest. You're right to ask them so I hope I’ve given you some idea. Thanks, guys. Thank you very much."

He left then, back to the realization of an adaptation he had been working on for over 2 years before he had created something he believes to be good, something true to Ender's spirit.

I have no doubt that he has succeeded.

--

Coming tomorrow: Part 3 - Costumes and Props

Set Visit Report #1: The Production Art Tour

"Can you guess this?"

At his question, we smiled and shuffled in our seats. It certainly looked like the giant and the impossible game he played with the tiny mouse, but now was not the time to jump to conclusions, not with producer Bob Orci looking so entirely pleased at the front of the room.

"The Mind Game! In the Mind Game, you know, in order to contrast it with the technology and the sci-fi -- this is more beautiful and impressionistic and just fantasy-like," Orci went on, clearly unaware of the bomb he had just dropped.

"Wait… so, it's being filmed? The Mind Game?"

"It's in the movie."

That was only a few seconds of the hour-and-a-half long roller coaster ride that was the Ender's Game production art tour -- and the tour was only the tip of the iceberg. During our set visit on May 22, 2012, we had the fortunate opportunity to sit and chat with the film's producers, actors, and production team, having intimate discussions in which we learned tons of exciting tidbits about how they brought Ender's story to life.

What you'll be reading the next few days is what we discovered.

© Summit Entertainment

The movie was, for the most part, filmed in chronological order, something the producers were immensely glad about later since Asa Butterfield (Ender Wiggin) grew nearly three inches during filming. "He starts the movie seeming like a much smaller kid and by the end of it, as he becomes a leader, he's actually sort of grown into it." Orci explained. "I think it's going to have a weird, subtle, psychological effect when you're watching it in the movie. We've been shooting it chronologically so let's talk about method acting, huh? 'GROW!'"

While it isn't clear over the course of the film exactly how much time passes, Bob Orci assured us that they do sort-of specify -- in height.

"Three inches pass," he winked.

So, why Asa? What was it about this then soon-to-be 15-year-old boy that made everyone who met him believe he could pull off a credible and moving Ender Wiggin?

"[During] the casting process we looked at a wide age range and ultimately the only thing that mattered is who would we believe could be Ender and who would we believe could be the leader of his peers by the end of the film in a believable way," producer Linda McDonough explained, "He has that deep, wise soulfulness in his performance. [...] And so all of the things that you get in the book where people judge him at first blush as an underdog? We still have that in Asa's interpretation of the character."

For younger, supporting members of the cast, they needed actors who were talented, athletic, and willing to work really, really hard.

© Aramis Knight

"When you spend time with them at the press conference, you should ask them about their time at Space Camp and also the military training they did," McDonough suggested, "Because, you know, whether you have twenty kids or a hundred -- when you're talking about the extras, they have to all be prepared to march and know how to do it and make it look good before you start shooting. I think that that's kind of a cool experience for them because it was months of training while we were prepping the film."

While there was a lot of hard work, the kids definitely got to kick back on the weekends -- on occasion to the dismay of the adults in charge. One day, during a Walmart run to grab a few much-needed supplies, McDonough spotted some very familiar faces outside the sliding glass doors: several younger members of the Ender's Game cast -- all on bicycles.

"I'm like, 'How did you guys get here?' It wasn't in a good part of town and I was like, 'Ahh! Actors! Where are your parents?!' And they're like, 'We took our per diem! We took a cab to buy cheap bikes!' and then they rode off and this looked like ET, this little pack of them going."

Ender's jeesh.

Peddling off into the sunset that day, friends from the moment they first met at the welcome dinner in New Orleans, it seems unlikely that these boys had any idea about the long road that had been travelled to see them there that day. But as she stood in the parking lot watching them speed away, McDonough knew, and so did the other excited men and women we shared a room with last year.

A Futuristic Earth

Set during an unspecified time in the future, Ender's world is a far cry from the dystopia we are so used to seeing today in futuristic YA tales such as The Hunger Games or Divergent. There are no barbed-wire fences or barefoot children running around looking for scraps. It is a rich, colorful Earth, filled with beauty and art, where the citizens thrive under an authoritarian yet very peaceful government. "A world worth saving," Orci smiled as he flipped to a mock-up of Ender's classroom.  "Looks like my classroom as a kid."

© Summit Entertainment

And the production artists took care to ensure many elements of Ender's earthly environment remain familiar to those of us stuck in 2013. Even the Wiggin family house, while most likely equipped with a far better home theater system, isn't so different from fairly modern homes you might run across today. "Why wouldn't there be classic houses?" Orci asked, pointing out that the Vatican has existed virtually unaltered for the past 500 years. Even the location Ender visits on the lake during his short landside leave with Valentine - the veterans' retreat - looks very much like a resort you could currently find nestled in a forest in North Carolina.

© Summit Entertainment

While many aspects of Ender Wiggin's futuristic world have remained relatively unchanged, there is one area that has flourished: the space program. When sitting down to decide on a look for advanced launch vehicles, the production team was fortunate enough to be able to consult Elon Musk, a genius in the field of rocket technology.

"Originally we had concept art of shuttles taking off like an airplane, like a shuttle, and he said, ‘No, that's highly... that would never happen. Since you're trying to get up, just point the damn thing up!'" Orci laughed.

"And that's what the future's gonna be."

Battle School

© Summit Entertainment

So, the shuttle was pointed up -- and aimed directly at Battle School.

Very early renderings of the Battle School were nearly identical to the structure we recently saw in the trailers: an enormous space station located within Earth's orbit with giant rings containing the student and faculty's living quarters. The entire construction rotates around a massive, transparent sphere -- effectively creating gravity everywhere except where it's not needed: the Battle Room, the center of the school and the focus of everyone who lives there.

And the film's version is definitely a far cry from the dark, nondescript Battle Room of the book. "One of the big changes, obviously, is that the Battle Room is transparent," Orci pointed out. "That allows us to have the light change. It gives the feeling when you're out there that you're actually in space ‘cause you can see the Earth out the window, you can see the sun, you can see the moon and it just gave it this scope that seemed to be practical for the fact that they're training these kids to operate in space." They plan to make good use of lighting changes; some battles will take place at night, some during the day, and every time the Battle Room is shown there will be a different feel to the incredible null-g environment.

© Summit Entertainment

While a lot of the Battle Room must be computer-generated, the majority of the Battle School hallways and rooms were built to scale as it was important to director Gavin Hood that the actors had tangible spaces to work in. To emulate the school's ringed hallways, they constructed a set piece they called "Corridor A," a beautiful, curved walkway they used to film the cast travelling up and around the ring. Unfortunately it wasn't there when we visited; to make room for other set pieces, it had been torn down, though it had been a cast and crew favorite.

"We had a little memorial for it last week," producer Linda McDonough admitted.

While the Battle Room is a huge part of Battle School, just like in the book, it's not all lasers and flash suits. The young soldiers also attend to their lessons - though it doesn't seem to be biology and literature books they're cracking. It's in history class where they study the Formic invasion and Mazer Rackham's incredible victory. It's in these classrooms, which were also built to scale in New Orleans, where the young soldiers view footage or "vids" of Earth's first interaction with the Buggers -- and not just on their desks, but displayed in front of them using advanced holographic technology.

It will be easy to see in the film how these videos could be used as pro-Fleet propaganda on Earth: The swarms of Formic jets well outnumber Mazers fleet, with fighters that are advanced but not a huge leap from the ones we fly today, "We want it to seem grounded and more immediate. You know, that this is something that's gonna happen to us soon," Orci explained.

The Mind Game

Bob Orci called it "beautiful, impressionistic, and fantasy-like," a mixture of motion-capture mixed with artistic renderings. In the film, Ender plays the game on his desk, and the audience will be sucked into this beautiful, fantasy world not just once, but off and on throughout the film -- the same way Ender experienced it in the book.

We got a brief look at the production art of the mind game, including the mirror Ender peers into and sees Peter instead of himself reflected back. I remember it being faintly reminiscent of the "Tale of the Three Brothers" animation in the final Harry Potter film - gorgeous, and I can't wait to see the final product.

Eros and the Final Simulation

While Earth is all greens and blues and Battle School filled with steel blues and grays, the Eros of the film, while maybe not specifically called by name, is a beautiful amber color.  It's a formerly thriving planet which was occupied by, not a monstrous race, but an intelligent species with culture, history, and dreams of colonization. The surface of Eros, which in part jets up toward the sky in skyscraper-esque dwellings, is only the tip of an iceberg; the structures stand tall above miles and miles of underground tunnels in which the humans later bolted in their steel walkways - which we got to visit while in New Orleans!

© Summit Entertainment

"To interpret the idea of the Formics being an insect-like race in a sense, cinematically, Gavin was very much inspired by the giant ant hills of South Africa which is his home country," McDonough revealed, with Orci nodding in the background. "When Lynn says giant ant hills in South Africa, she means giant ant hills in South Africa. Like spires, totally gigantic. And Gavin can explain this, how it's all about keeping the queen totally comfortable in her air conditioned chamber."

Eros is the home of Command School where Ender and his friends are sent to complete their training with the International Fleet -- but the film's version is obviously not a factual representation of the real-life Eros asteroid that sits between Mars and Jupiter today. That particular tiny, potato-shaped rock has no atmosphere, almost no gravity, certainly no underground structures; it would fit on Vancouver Island more than 82 times.

Command School is also the location of the battle simulation room where Graff and his team overlook Ender's final exam from a observation deck above. And this room is absolutely epic.

During his final battles, Ender is standing on a podium in an absolutely cavernous chamber with the most elite of his soldiers and his very best friends forming an arc in front of him, each on their own console, helping control the ships' movements. The scene looks very much like a deadly symphony is playing with Ender Wiggin as the conductor.

It is going to be a gorgeous visual experience, the entire simulation playing out in front of Ender and his confidants in encompassing holographic projections. For the young soldiers, what they are experiencing both looks and feels real.

Sequels

So how does it end? I can't tell you that. Will there be sequels? Maybe, but Bob Orci doesn't like to count his chickens before they hatch, though there's no harm in ensuring that the coop's big enough.

"[We have to make sure] that emotionally it is over in a way, it is a chapter. The emotional chapter is, ‘I now know the truth and I won't stand by and let that stand. I must make that right and I will make it right.' And that is him coming into his own so it's all about what you feel at the end. The idea is to make it feel that he is making a promise to do right and that's lots of classic films. Use that logic even though I could continue on."

"Any movie could have another chapter."

--

Make sure you also check out the set visit reports from EnderWiggin.net and Ender's Ansible!

Coming tomorrow: Part 2 - Interview with Gavin Hood

Set Visit Reports Rolling Out - Starting Wednesday, July 10th!

Hey Launchies! Do you remember back 411 long days ago when the Ender's Game fan site owners all flew to New Orleans to tour the set, touch flash suits, and spend the day chatting with the cast and crew? Do you remember how frustrating it was for you (and us!) that we couldn't share anything and all the waiting and teasing that's been going on since then?

Well, the wait is over! This Wednesday, July 10th, Ender News and the other 3 sites who participated in the tour last May will be releasing the first part of our series of set visit reports. And we can't wait to share!

(UPDATE: The studio has asked that we hold on posting our set visit reports for the time being; we will update as soon as we're back on!)

The day of the set visit! Can you find all 4 of us?

We'll be answering many of the questions we know you guys have been dying to ask, including:

- Was the Mind Game filmed?
- What do the buggers look like?
- What's up with the braille on the soldier's name tags?
- Exactly how many Jeesh members are needed to take Nonso Anozie down?

It's so exciting to finally be able to share our experience with all of you!  Check back on Wednesday - you won't be disappointed!

(UPDATE: The studio has asked that we hold on posting our set visit reports for the time being; we will update as soon as we're back on!)