One Of The Most Difficult Parts Of Making WandaVision Will Surprise You



The newest Marvel Cinematic Universe entry, WandaVision, is attempting something no other MCU movie or TV has tried--old and basic special effects. As it turns out, that's not an easy task.

The time has nearly arrived. In mere days, the first Marvel Studios project in over a year will be released when the first two episodes of WandaVision premiere on Disney+. This isn't your run of the mill MCU movie or TV show, though. As the first entry in Phase 4, it's setting aside Marvel's traditional comic book style to instead pay tribute to the great sitcoms throughout TV history.

From classic sitcoms Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie, all the way through The Brady Bunch and even Full House, WandaVision goes out of its way to recreate the style of those iconic TV shows as closely as possible--right down to the visual effects.

Of course, one of the things the MCU is most synonymous with is cutting-edge visual effects, which attempt to make the extraordinary seem commonplace--be it men in robot suits fighting men exposed to radiation that makes them gigantic or massive purple alien monsters snapping humanity out of existence on a whim. Those don't exactly fit in with the '50s sitcom aesthetic, though. In those shows, nearly all special effects were smaller in scale and done practically, for better or worse.

For WandaVision director Matt Shakman, there was only one way to stay true to the show's conceit: to do visual effects the way they used to be done in sitcoms. "I love the practical effects for I Dream of Jeannie and Bewitched," he told GameSpot. "They're so charming and I think we knew right from the get-go that we should really embrace that."

Whether it was hanging things on fishing wire to make them appear to float or using some of the most basic animated effects to show off Wanda's (Elizabeth Olsen) powers, it was no easy task to recreate things practically as they would have been done originally. In fact, the process left Shakman even more impressed by what visual effects artists were able to do back then without the tools used today.

"It's like marionettes and puppeteering," he explained. "[We're] trying to capture that spirit and do what they did on that show. They did an amazing job on Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie doing what they did. It's hard, I know, to do what they did. Even now, with all of our tools, It's hard. So hats off to them."

While it might seem strange that such simple effects would be difficult to pull off given what's possible now, keep in mind that doing the effects as practically as possible leaves room for things to go wrong or look bad--especially if you don't have the right person leading the special effects team. Luckily for Shakman, he had special effects supervisor Dan Sudick, who's worked on practically every MCU movie thus far, leading his team.

Got a news tip : pgslot