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Rebel Moon

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021
Rebel Moon is an upcoming two-part film directed by Zack Snyder and written by Snyder, Shay Hatten (writer, Army of the Dead), and Kurt Johnstad (writer, 300). The film will be produced by Deborah Snyder, Zack Snyder, their production partners Wesley Coller of The Stone Quarry and Eric Newman of Grand Electric.

Production Weekly reported that the two parts of the film are being filmed back-to-back from April 18 to November 4, and the movie officially began filming on April 19.

Rebel Moon originated as a Star Wars concept that Snyder pitched to Lucasfilm about a decade ago, following-up on the events of Return of the Jedi, with new Jedi warriors embarking on a dangerous mission. Disney purchased Lucasfilm in 2012, which put a pause on production talks. Snyder and Newman at one point deliberated on making it into a series, but ultimately decided to make it a feature film and an original IP, rather than something that'll be read as Zack Snyder's The Mandalorian now that The Mandalorian's been out for a few seasons.

Synopsis​

Rebel Moon will follow the residents of a peaceful colony in a distant galaxy as they struggle against an impending invasion by a warlord named Balisarius. The female protagonist (portrayed by Sofia Boutella) is tasked with recruiting warriors from neighboring planets to oppose the invading force.


Production​

NameRole
Zack SnyderDirected by, story by, produced by, director of photography
Deborah SnyderProduced by
Wesley CollerProduced by
Eric NewmanProduced by
Sarah BowenExecutive producer
Kurt JohnstadStory by
Shay HattenScreenplay by
Dody DornEditor

Cast​

NameRole
Sofia BoutellaKora
Charlie HunnamKai
Djimon HounsouGeneral Titus
Ray FisherDarrian Bloodaxe
Doona BaeNemesis
Jena MaloneHarmada
Staz NairTarak
E. DuffyMilius
Charlotte MaggiSam
Sky YangAris
Ed Skrein (replacing Rupert Friend)Admiral Atticus Noble
Stuart MartinTBA
Cary ElwesKing of the Galactic Empire
Corey StollTBA
Stuart MartinTBA
Michiel HuismanGunnar
Alfonso HerreraTBA
Cleopatra ColemanDevra Bloodaxe
Fra FeeRegent Balisarius
Rhian ReesTBA
Anthony HopkinsJimmy
Dustin CeithamerJimmy (body only)
Christine Kellogg-DarrinHervor
Stella Grace FitzgeraldPrincess Issa
Kayden KoshelevFinn
Rayne BidderMaia
Kingston FosterEdda
Trisha SimmonsVeldt Drummer
Daniel CobdenVeldt Kid
Mikel FarberReaper
Hamish SturgeonCommanding Officer
Ingvar SigurdssonHagen
Jay HectorThe Gen. Docking Officer
Daisy DavisRebel Pilot
Michael Wayne JamesPatron
Jordan ColemanBackground alien
John OrrPriest (alien)
Anselmo Giovanni BehrensBackground (creature actor)
Giovanni LopesMan of Daggus
Meredith VanCuykCourtesan
TrishnaSamarian Royal
David SlamanThresher
Michaela RancesThresher
Pia SaloThresher
Vera MyersToan Priestess
Oliver FredinReaper
Thomas OhrstromTorvald
Skylar Okerstrom-LangOskar
Sam BassTBA supporting role
Dominic BurgessDash Thif
Darren JacobsTBA supporting role
Ray PorterTBA
Gordon TarpleyPatron
Danielle BurgioInge
Colby LemmoTBA
Tomm VossKullen
Patrick LuwisIvar
Christina LargentTBA
Raven Armando AstoneTBA
Josefine LindegaardGreta
Sisse MarieAstrid
Isabella BrenzaTBA
Mario G ValdezTBA
Mark StegerLifty
Christopher Matthew CookXimon
Zack PalmisanoPatron
Allen Lee HaffSoldier
Vaia ZaganasToan Priestess
Greg KriekMarcus
Caden DragomerEljun
Thor KnaiHjalmar
Justin PriceRebel Pilot
Melissa HuntBrenn
Geoffrey Dean MallardPatron / Veldt Villager
Max PescherineShooter
Richard CetroneLead Krypteian
Michael James BellAssistant Medical Technician
Brett Robert CulbertGunnery Commander
Kendall WellsKaan
Adam J. SmithLead Medical Technician
Claire Liz PhillipsReaper
Matt NolanSgt. Loader
Alex MortensenHangar Officer
Zach Paul BrownHangar Officer #2
Frank ScozzariDaggus Cobalt Miner

Art department​

NameRole
Marcus TaorminaVFX supervisor
Justin RaleighSpecial effects makeup designer
Jared PurringtonIllustrator
Pat PresleyConcept artist
Jason PastranaCostume concept artist
Chris GlennConcept artist
Lee BermejoArtist

Production companies​

CompanyRole
The Stone QuarryProduction
Grand ElectricProduction
NetflixDistribution
Luma PicturesVisual effects
Fractured FX Inc.Makeup & prosthetics
Medieval ArmouryProps
RED Digital CinemaCameras
ZERØ OPTIKCustom camera lenses
Green Meadow GrowersPlants



Concept Art​

Rebel-Moon.jpg

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Behind the Scenes Images​

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My thoughts?

The film is gonna look great. The detail on Djimon Honsou's armor is fantastic.

... Wait a minute....

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... Is that Sora's crown?

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Kingdom Hearts is part of Rebel Moon's continuity, confirmed! /s
 
Last edited:

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021

Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon: Part 2 Is Already In Production

Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon: Part 2 is currently in production and is among the four big-budget films receiving California’s tax credit program subsidies. With $83 million in qualified spending, Rebel Moon: Part 2 will receive an estimated $16,618,000 in tax credits.

In a statement California Film Commission Executive Director Colleen Bell told (Via Deadline) “We are thrilled to continue welcoming the kind of big-budget films that used to be so susceptible to runaway production.” he added, “In addition to our incentive, we have the best talent, crews, infrastructure, locations, weather, and so much more. California is ready to help filmmakers make the most of all we have to offer.”

rebel-moonw.jpg


Rebel Moon is directed by Zack Snyder from a screenplay he co-wrote with Shay Hatten and Kurt Johnstad, The film is based on a story he also created with Johnstad. Rebel Moon stars Sofia Boutella as Kora, Charlie Hunnam, Ray Fisher as Blood Axe, Djimon Hounsou as General Titu, Anthony Hopkins, Doona Bae, Staz Nair, Alfonso Herrera, Jena Malone, Stuart Martin, Ed Skrein, Cary Elwes, and Corey Stoll.

According to Netflix’s short synopsis, Rebel Moon follows a peaceful colony on the edge of the galaxy that is threatened by the armies of a tyrannical regent named Balisarius. The desperate civilians dispatch a young woman who has a mysterious past to seek out warriors from nearby planets to help them challenge the regent.

Looks like progress is going well on the movie, and the project should be expected to conclude filming in November as estimated.


Pictures:

Zack Snyder on the set of Rebel Moon: "#rebelmoon "low angle""

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Sofia Boutella's pictures on location:

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Photos of a thatched roof village, possibly Kora's home, as suggested in the last picture:

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Anthony Hopkins's character, JC1435 a.k.a. Jimmy, “a sentient JC1435 mechanized battle robot and one-time defender of the slain King.”

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Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021
Sofia Boutella finished her work in Rebel Moon after 152 shooting days, and both parts are wrapped up. She was still seen working out in Zack Snyder's home gym about a week ago, possibly for pickups or reshoots or maybe she just enjoys working out, but Jesus Christ is she gonna be yoked when the movie actually comes out. :ROFL:
 

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021
Nine second teaser for Rebel Moon near the end of Netflix's 2023 showcase.

 

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021

Vanity Fair: Zack Snyder Goes Galactic: Exclusive First Look at Rebel Moon


Zack Snyder is world-building once again with Rebel Moon. This time the 300 and Justice League filmmaker is creating not just one world but a sprawling menagerie of planets, full of cyborg warriors with molten-metal swords, giant half-humanoid arachnids, and ancient robots that seem to have emerged more from medieval times than the future. The new Netflix space saga that Snyder directed and cowrote extends far beyond the verdant orb of the title. That moon is actually one of the more modest worlds. It circles an immense gas giant at a distant edge of the galaxy and is populated mainly by farmers. It's nowhere special, but it’s about to change the balance of power in this fictional universe.

While any sci-fi extravaganza naturally features copious digital effects, Snyder also used his estimated budget of at least $166 million to manifest as much of it in real life as possible. In a Santa Clarita canyon just outside Los Angeles, a full-size abandoned starfighter decays not far from what appears to be an idyllic Scandinavian-style village, complete with clusters of homes, shops, and barns, as well as a stone bridge arching over a crystalline river. (Team Snyder also built the river.) Vast fields of actual wheat sprout from desert hardpan never meant for such lush growth, but Snyder insisted on real crops for his farmers to harvest and defend. Just over the rocky hillside sits another Rebel Moon set for a larger community known as Providence that looks like an Old West metropolis. All of these are just locations on the moon of the title; there are other worlds beyond.

This story, which Snyder has been mulling for more than three decades, focuses on outcasts, malcontents, and refugees from many disparate planets who join forces to rise up together against a punishing authoritarian government. As in real life, uniting so many different factions is easier proposed than accomplished, both in the story and behind the scenes as multiple plotlines entwine. In every way, Rebel Moon is a heavy lift.

“I’m a glutton for punishment. I don’t know why I always make an ensemble movie. I can’t wait to not do that. But in the meantime, of course…I love it,” Snyder says. He feels that constructing his worlds in real life makes the otherworldly feel more immersive. “This movie was me going, ‘Of course it’s a space opera, but let’s not lens it that way. Let’s lens it in a more intimate way, so that the sci-fi elements feel more grounded.’ We’re not always saying, ‘Look at how big our spaceships are or how weird our planets look!’ That happens, but it happens as an organic part of the world you’re in. You’re there, and so the things you see on that journey are not forced upon you or spoon-fed to you.”

FL-RebelMoon-7.jpg

Rebel Moon Lineup: Nemesis (Doona Bae), Bloodaxe (Ray Fisher), Tarak (Staz Nair), Gunnar (Michiel Huisman), Kora (Sofia Boutella), Kai (Charlie Hunnam) and Milius (E. Duffy), and General Titus (Djimon Hounsou.)


Snyder shares these thoughts while sitting in a tavern built on the port city set, sweating profusely as he directs a gunfight sequence. A network of overhead pipes creates a thunderstorm that transforms the desert dust into pools of sticky mud while the heroes and villains blast at each other. When we spoke last summer, Rebel Moon was about halfway through principal photography, with more than three months to go. Snyder couldn’t have looked giddier. After an excruciating, combative experience building the DC superhero universe for Warner Bros.—and then seeing it scrapped—Snyder has finally found a studio that has given him epic trust to match its epic funding.

Debuting on Netflix on December 22, Rebel Moon is not just one movie—it’s already a saga, with plans to split the film into two parts. (That makes the $166 million price tag, estimated from California tax filings, a two-for-one bargain at around $83 million each.) The second part's release date has not yet been settled, but Snyder wants it to follow closely on the heels of the first one. “It won’t be long after. Netflix can do things that a traditional studio can’t do as far as how close together the movies are released," he says.

Also arriving at later dates will be more explicit, harder-edged cuts of the two movies. The first version of Rebel Moon to hit screens will be a fantasy adventure “that anyone can enjoy and watch,” Snyder says. The later cut will be strictly for adults. “I think for fans of mine and people who are ready to take a deeper, harder dive, that’ll be fun for them,” he says.

It’s already fun for him. “Originally, the script was one movie, but it was in ‘Zack form,’” says his wife and longtime producing partner, Deborah Snyder. “It was 172 pages.” Typically, a page of script equals a minute onscreen. So Rebel Moon was shaping up to be approximately three hours long—which worried Netflix film chairman Scott Stuber. “Stuber was like, ‘On the service, under-two-hour movies really do better for some reason,’ even though you’ll binge-watch a series of eight episodes,” Deborah Snyder says. “Zack said, ‘If you ask me to make this less than two hours, I’m going to lose all the character. You won’t care about these people. It’s a character story about how people can change, and redemption, and what are you willing to fight for…’ So he said, ‘What if I give you two movies?’”

If that gamble pays off, there may be many more Rebel Moons to come. It all starts with that nowhere world covered in fields of wheat.

FL-RebelMoon-9.jpg

Kora (Sofia Boutella) and Gunnar (Michiel Huisman) in a rainstorm, work to find fighters to defend their moon from the Imperium.


The moon of Veldt is a David facing down the Goliath of the Mother World, which has amassed abundant wealth, political power, and an immense army. Veldt is nowhere special—until the rulers of the Mother World decide to seize it as a breadbasket.

“They land in the village to say, ‘Listen, you guys will be our local food source while we’re tromping around this part of the galaxy. So how long till the harvest comes in?’ The villagers are pretty much stunned by the brutality, but they don’t realize what level the Mother World’s ready to go to,” Zack Snyder says.

A newcomer named Kora (Sofia Boutella) rallies them to resist rather than roll over. She has been hiding on this moon after fleeing from her own role within the leadership of that oppressive government. (That’s her abandoned starship out beyond the wheat fields.) “The Imperium comes down, and they want to take the women and take the children and they need more soldiers,” Deborah Snyder says. “They’re going to take their food. And [the villagers] go, ‘Look, we can bargain with them.’”

The fugitive hiding in their midst is the only one who knows how foolhardy that is. “Kora used to be in the Imperium, and she’s like, ‘Guys, this ends badly for everybody,’” Zack Snyder says.

FL-Rebel-Moon-BTS-2.jpg

Fields of Gold: Filmmaker Zack Snyder and producer Deborah Snyder behind the scenes on Rebel Moon.


Boutella sees the character as a symbol for the way people ignore or run from the problems in their lives, until they can’t anymore. “She knows the guilt that she’s been living with, and the first step of her redemption is doing something about it instead of going away,” says the actor, best known for Atomic Blonde and playing the title role in 2017’s The Mummy opposite Tom Cruise. “I think that, as much as it is sci-fi, it’s a very human story,” she says.

This humble moon of Veldt is a greater danger than anyone realizes because the Mother World’s grip on its empire is secretly weakening and slipping. “They’ve conquered the universe, they’ve scooped everyone into the empire, and they’ve had to make individual deals with the different leaders of the different worlds. You can imagine how complicated that is. A lot of rulers felt like they made a bad deal, or that their fathers’ fathers made a bad deal. They begin to push back,” Zack Snyder says. “It’s more whispers at first. We’re right on the edge of revolution, and if our villagers are successful, the example of that could spur an even bigger revolt.”

Since these Veldt farmers can’t possibly fight the Imperium alone, Kora sets off with a mercenary starship pilot named Kai (Sons of Anarchy’s Charlie Hunnam) to find help, since his Tawau-Class freighter is necessary to get them off-world and back again. It's not a ride built for comfort. Very little in Rebel Moon has a high gloss.

“It’s more of a dieselpunk world than a steampunk world,” Snyder says. “There is a sort of higher-energy source than gasoline, since they have a way of jumping across vast swaths of the universe, but the technology hasn’t really changed in quite a while.” Snyder’s universe has become a stagnant one, in part because of the dictatorship weighing down on it and siphoning its resources.

FL-RebelMoon-12.jpg

Charlie Hunnam as the starship pilot Kai, a galactic gun-for-hire, seen here aboard his freighter.


Kora has only a few months to assemble her fighters before the Mother World’s forces return to Veldt to collect their harvest. “The advantage that they would have is, they could set a trap for the Imperium,” Snyder says. “A lot of times, if you’re fighting in a guerrilla war, you don’t know where the bad guys are going to be. But in this case, you know in nine weeks they’re going to be right there. So they could set a pretty insane trap for them. Of course, it all goes sideways. But that’s the initial plan.”

Kora is joined by Gunnar (Michiel Huisman, of Game of Thrones and The Haunting of Hill House), a handsome but meek farmer she has befriended. While the pilot Kai has seen a lot of fighting and knows the back channels to various other guns for hire, Gunnar is naive about the world outside his village. He knows a lot about wheat, though. “There’s a scene where Charlie says, ‘What do you do in the village?’ And Gunnar goes, ‘Well, I’m in charge of the harvest. I catalog seeds.’ Charlie’s like, ‘Oh…okay,’” Snyder says. “In a lot of ways, the whole village, they have a slightly naive view of what the Imperium is capable of. They don’t think they’ll just be murdered by them.”

Sofia Boutella's Kora finds Djimon Hounsou's General Titus living as a gladiator and asks him to fight the Mother World...

Sofia Boutella’s Kora finds Djimon Hounsou’s General Titus living as a gladiator and asks him to fight the Mother World he once defended.


Together, Kora, Kai, and Gunnar recruit the most fearsome, calculating, and deadly warriors they can find on other subjugated worlds. Snyder spells out some of his inspirations: “It’s The Dirty Dozen, The Wild Bunch, The Magnificent Seven—anytime there’s either a village or a town that is threatened, that needs a gunfighter to come and do the dirty work that the townspeople can’t do.”

The first thing the village needs is a general capable of commanding the fighters the group hopes to assemble. That leads Kora to General Titus, played by Djimon Hounsou (Amistad, Guardians of the Galaxy). “She finally tracks him down at this coliseum on a sort of gladiator planet, where he’s drunk and sad and doesn’t want anything to do with anybody,” Snyder says. “She’s trying to convince him to join up. There’s events that happened to him in the past that made him have to leave the Imperium and actually become an enemy of the Mother World. That scarred him.”

Staz Nair as Tarak a barbarianinspired warrior with a royal history who now labors to pay off a lifedebt.

Staz Nair as Tarak, a barbarian-inspired warrior with a royal history who now labors to pay off a life-debt.


Another of the brawlers they seek is Tarak, a character who’s more Tarzan than space warrior. The bare-chested brawler (played by Supergirl and Game of Thrones actor Staz Nair) is in sync with nature to the degree that he can bond with a griffin-like flying beast called a Bennu and ride it into battle. Snyder wanted the members of the squad to each have a distinct style, so Tarak is inspired by Conan the Barbarian and the brawny warriors seen in the art of the iconic sword-and-sorcery illustrator Frank Frazetta.

“When we first meet Tarak, he’s the indentured servant of this rancher, and he’s working the anvil as a blacksmith,” Snyder says. “They ask him if he’ll join, and he’s like, ‘I would love to, but I’m in debt to this guy and I’m going to honor that. That’s the kind of guy I am.’ So they figure out a way to get him to join. His backstory is that he comes from a noble family and they had a run-in with the Mother World. In a lot of ways, all the characters have a bone to pick with the Mother World.”

Bae Doona at the forefront as the swordmaster Nemesis. Behind her from the left Charlie Hunnam's Kai Staz Nair's Tarak a...

Doona Bae at the forefront as a swordmaster named Nemesis. Behind her, from the left: Charlie Hunnam’s Kai, Staz Nair’s Tarak, a local bystander, and Michiel Huisman’s Gunnar.


Another member with an axe to grind actually wields two flaming swords. South Korean actor Doona Bae plays Nemesis, a swordmaster who is partly mechanical. “These swords are powered by the gauntlets that she holds. The gauntlets are these ancient [artifacts] from her home world, and part of the rite of passage of being a warrior in her world is you have to cut your arm off, and then you put these kind of robot arms on. That allows you to wield these molten-metal blades,” Snyder says.
She inhabits a mining world that’s ruled by the Imperium, which extracts everything useful while leaving little for the planet’s inhabitants. “Nemesis is able to navigate the alleys and nooks and crannies, and she’s been sort of protecting the exploited workers of that world,” Snyder says.

Bae Doona as Nemesis a defender of the poor and oppressed and Michiel Huisman's Gunnar a farmer not trained for warfare.

Doona Bae as Nemesis, a defender of the poor and oppressed, and Michiel Huisman’s Gunnar, a farmer not trained for warfare.


The filmmaker reunited with Ray Fisher, his Cyborg actor from the DC films, by casting him alongside Cleopatra Coleman (The Last Man on Earth, Dopesick); the two play Darrian and Devra, a brother-and-sister team known as the Bloodaxes. They are galactic insurgents who have been angering the Mother World with a hit-and-run spree of attacks against the Imperium, without being especially effective at stopping its reign of abuse and terror.

“They fight and hide. They don’t have the resources to have a pitched battle in the wide open,” Snyder says. “They’re kind of just ****ing with supply lines and blowing up train tracks. That’s their kind of thing.”

Ray Fisher as Darien Bloodaxe an insurgent who stages covert attacks on the Mother World's dictatorship.

Ray Fisher as Darien Bloodaxe, an insurgent who stages covert attacks on the Mother World’s dictatorship.


The final human member of the team is Milius, played by newcomer E. Duffy. The character, like the performer, is nonbinary, so the director uses they/them pronouns when describing their backstory. Milius is a refugee from a farming world similar to Veldt—one that chose to cooperate rather than resist, and was subsequently demolished.

“They came from a small farming village that got destroyed, and their people never really stood up. They got slaughtered,” Snyder says.
Milius wants justice for what happened but doesn’t have any special weaponry or training. Snyder says they bring something else to the team. “I think it’s heart,” he says. “That really is their specialty. In a lot of ways, they have the purest motivation to fight. Everyone else is battling some past demon, whereas Milius feels, ‘My world was destroyed, and it was very similar to this world. I didn’t get a chance to defend it, so I choose this one to defend.’”

E. Duffy as the refugee turned resistance fighter Milius with Staz Nair as Tarak in Rebel Moon.

E. Duffy as the refugee turned resistance fighter Milius, with Staz Nair as Tarak in Rebel Moon.


There are even more outlandish characters who enter the fight, among them an ethereal spider-being played by Jena Malone and an ornate, centuries-old robot known as a Jimmy (voiced by Anthony Hopkins). The Jimmys were mechanical knights, relics of a bygone age, now mostly gone. This one endures in the wild, trying to merge the natural world with its mechanical form.

Opposing these heroes is an Imperium enforcer known as Admiral Noble (Ed Skrein), a volatile and cruel emissary from the Mother World with a chip on his shoulder. He serves under Regent Balisarius (Fra Fee, from 2012's Les Misérables and Hawkeye), who presides over this sector of the universe.
Noble, contrary to his name, demonstrates his loyalty and strength with sociopathic indifference. “I’ve played antagonists at points in my career in the past, and I think when I’ve done it well, I’ve been able to add some kind of humanity and some kind of empathy to the characters. This is a bit different,” says the actor, best known for his dastardly characters in Deadpool and Maleficent: Mistress of Evil.

“With this character, I pointedly chose to leave humanity out of it completely for the first time,” Skrein says. “I’m not occupied with gaining your empathy. It will be interesting to see what the audience’s reactions are to it. Noble has chosen to exist outside of what he sees as the limitations of morality.”

Ed Skrein as the Mother World enforcer Admiral Noble flanked by two Scribes who record  the dictatorship's history.

Ed Skrein as the Mother World enforcer Admiral Noble, flanked by two Scribes, who record (and distort) the dictatorship’s history.


Accompanying Noble are horrific masked figures known as the Scribes, priests from the religious order that dominates the Mother World. “Their purpose is, they write down information,” Snyder says. But instead of text, they use living human beings as their paper and implant memories and images into them.

“Your DNA stores information,” Snyder explains. “You are put in stasis if you’re a page, and your body just becomes like a hard drive. The Scribes have the ability to transfer what they see. That’s how history is recorded by the Mother World. You can plug into those things later, and you experience the history as a memory. But the Scribes, of course, are manipulated by politics, and they write down only what they’re supposed to.”

It sounds like a fate worse than death, but the Mother World distributes a lot of death as well, usually by way of its Dreadnaught battleships. One such starship that looms large in Rebel Moon is The King’s Gaze. “That ship is a world destroyer. There’s, like, 8,000 soldiers on that ship. They’ve got, like, 200 dropships and 100 tanks, and it has this huge boom-boom howitzer,” Snyder says. “It could raze the surface of a planet. If they just fired on a planet for three days straight, there’d be nothing left. They do that a lot.”

The Scribes are quasireligious figures who have the power to imprint memories in the mind of humans used as living...

The Scribes are quasi-religious figures who have the power to imprint memories in the mind of humans used as living history books.


Snyder knows it’s inevitable that some will label Rebel Moon as “Zack Snyder’s Star Wars.” Tonally, the Netflix film will be radically different from those set in that galaxy far, far away, but it does take place in a distant realm of space. And there is—as the title suggests—a struggling rebellion as well as a brutal dictatorship determined to crush it. “Of course those comparisons are going to be made,” Snyder says. “Anything that has a spaceship in it is going to be: ‘This is blank’s Star Wars.’ So I understand and sort of welcome the comparisons. But at the same time, I do believe that our thing is really an entirely different experience.”

Another reason he’s so accepting of the comparison is…once upon a time, even Snyder thought of Rebel Moon as Zack Snyder’s Star Wars. That’s how he pitched it to Lucasfilm more than a decade ago, just before Disney acquired the company and began making new movies.

“I was in postproduction on Man of Steel,” Snyder says. “I had heard there were rumblings about possibly doing another three [Star Wars] movies at some point. My take was that, if you just let me have the IP, I’ll make this cool movie, and I won’t get in the way of anything that you guys are doing.” In other words, his proposed film would feature original characters and a new storyline that didn’t necessarily impact or disrupt any of the existing Star Wars canon.

Snyder first met with Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy shortly before the company’s sale, and he later sat down with Disney’s then studio chief, Alan Horn, after the acquisition. While Snyder felt their reactions to his idea were promising, both the filmmaker and Lucasfilm ultimately decided it wasn’t going to work out.

Rebel Moon director writer and producer Zack Snyder behind the scenes of the twopart Netflix epic.

Rebel Moon director, writer, and producer Zack Snyder behind the scenes of the two-part Netflix epic.


The story proved to be extremely portable. Since Rebel Moon was pitched as something separate from the classic Star Wars storylines, it could survive on its own if need be. Snyder committed to making more DC superhero films—Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and the grueling Justice League—while Lucasfilm commissioned a new slate of films closely tied to the original Star Wars trilogy. “I didn’t really have time to do a Star Wars movie,” Snyder admits. “So it kind of worked out.”

But the idea continued to linger, as it had for decades. Snyder began to reimagine Rebel Moon as taking place in an original universe. Ironically, a similar thing happened in the ’70s when George Lucas, unable to secure the film rights to the Flash Gordon stories he loved as a boy, decided to make Star Wars in its own stand-alone world. Rebel Moon was ultimately revived as part of Snyder’s deal with Netflix, which produced the zombie heist-thriller Army of the Dead and its prequel, Army of Thieves.

The details of the film have evolved significantly from his Lucasfilm proposal, but the core of Rebel Moon remains close to the concept he originally crafted as a student in the late ’80s. “The concept came from being at film school. I think I had a pitch class—what would be a cool idea for a movie? And I was like: ‘a defending-the-village space movie,’” Snyder says. “Only afterward, I thought it would fit in the Star Wars universe. Then it went all the way back around,” he continues. “It’s been literally on the back burner for a long time. I don’t even know if the burner was on for a lot of that time.”

Now Rebel Moon is finally a reality. There is pressure to pull off what mainstream Hollywood has lately deemed impossible: introducing an epic world that isn’t already known to audiences, and making it a hit.

Deborah Snyder hopes the project will provide a pathway to new fans who love all the things that inspired it but are yearning for something fresh. “It has a bit of Star Wars. It has a bit of everything,” she says. “It’s a little bit like Lord of the Rings, a little bit Game of Thrones with the palace intrigue. And it’s really just a lot of what’s in Zack’s head.”
 

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021
The first two Rebel Moon movies have new titles and release dates,
Rebel Moon: A Child of Fire is set to release Dec 22 2023, while Rebel Moon: The Scargiver is speculated to release April 2024.

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The world premiere of the Rebel Moon teaser trailer will debut on August 22nd at Gamescom, as well as a "special announcement" rumored to be the tie-in video game.
 

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021

No trailer for the tie-in game, but it was mentioned at Gamescom along with the debut of this trailer.
Twitter in shambles that Snyder isn't as despised as they imagine him to be.
 

berto

I Saw the Devil
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I saw the trailer but I am really confused at what I'm looking at. I'm sure the actual films will be clear and it's not like I'm skipping it. At the very least it'll be a visual treat.
 

Morgan

Well-known Member
Premium
Xen-Ace 2021
I saw the trailer but I am really confused at what I'm looking at. I'm sure the actual films will be clear and it's not like I'm skipping it. At the very least it'll be a visual treat.
Oh yeah, for sure.

But it's funny because not knowing what you're seeing at least means the trailer isn't spoiling the entire plot for you to where you don't want to see it. :p

In that case, reading the following is optional in case you want to actually learn the situation as the movie itself tells it to you and provides the context.

Kora was part of the Imperium but defected to the planet Veldt. The Imperium's landed on Veldt to take its resources as dictatorships tend to do. Kora will leaves to gather the different warriors to fight against the Imperium/the Mother World.

The footage of her later in the trailer raising the red and white flag is a flashback of her time in the Imperium where she was known as "the Scargiver", and she's addressed by that title by Admiral Noble (Ed Skrein—who is NOT playing Balisarius and I have to edit the Credits post soon with the correct info).

The trailer is narrated by Jimmy (Sir Anthony Hopkins) relating a story about Princess Issa (Stella Grace Fitzgerald), "the Redeemer", and how the princess could end wars. She's already dead by the time Rebel Moon takes place. This girl is depicted as blonde and in a snowfield with white clothes later in the teaser, but as Jimmy refers to Princess Issa we instead see a completely different girl on a spaceship. This girl is Young Kora (played by Lila Barad).

General Titus (Djimon Hounsou) is on his knees, it's likely he lost a battle. People are shown with bags over their heads and eyes drawn on the bags. There was some early lore in previous articles about the "Scribes", the priests who serve the Mother World and imprint their memories onto "pages" who are living people. These bag-over-head people are potentially the Pages for the Scribes, since the history they're imprinted with is a memory seen from the eyes of the Scribe(s) that witnessed the event.

People are being led across a field—maybe the same field Jimmy's hand is seen in at the start. An unnamed man blows some wheat off of his hand. A statue is blown up. More people are getting corraled into spaceships while the wheat is set on fire in the background. This looks like standard behavior for the Mother World conquering planets and folding its people into part of the empire by erasing their past and livelihood.

Jimmy talks about having memories of a past he'll never see, loyalty to a king he cannot serve, and love for a child he could not save. The first part of that line is juxtaposed with a king's funeral, possibly the King of the Galactic Empire (Cary Elwes). He's wearing the same white clothing as Princess Issa to tie them together visually. Just before that are two people in black clothes mourning with a white griffin behind them. The part of the line mentioning a child he can't save is juxtaposed with Nemesis carrying a child, but who Jimmy is referring to is Princess Issa herself who was likely killed in an Imperium attack.

Kora alerts the villagers of Veldt of the coming Imperium arrival by hitting a bell. We see another flashback of Even Younger Kora (played by Elizabeth Martinez) alone a town with a Mother World tank destroying everything around her. She was likely kidnapped at that point at 9 years old and indoctrinated into the Imperium. An older Kora (Sofia Boutella this time) is seen in a crowd of similarly dressed soldiers hailing Regent/King Balisarius (Fra Fee). She has the line that she was a child of war and taught that "love is weakness", and it shows her next to a dead soldier who was likely her boyfriend at the time.

Nemesis (Bae Doo-na) is seen talking to Harmada (Jena Malone), who has a child clinging to her. Harmada is known to kidnap children in revenge for losing her own, and Nemesis says there's a difference between justice and revenge. This is likely a recruitment moment that goes sideways as Nemesis and Harmada have a fight over differing ideals—Nemesis is on the side of justice and stopping the Mother World from doing future bad things and making future orphans or worse, while Harmada is working through her grief in a recursive way because her kidnapping children won't exactly stop her from losing the new children or stop the Mother World, to be honest.

Nemesis is seen with her F-off awesome plasma blades as she fights Harmada. Lightsabers and Disney can suck it.

Admiral Noble warns someone, likely Kora, that there's a price for her defiance.

Quick cut to Kai (Charlie Hunnam, who is absolutely not Green Arrow), then quick cut to Tarak (Staz Nair) shouting—he appears to be captured/trapped as he witnesses something off screen, and I'm betting it's an execution of his loved ones or allies. Quick cut to a behind-view of a figure landing on the ground.

A woman is seen jumping off of a building and a man in a hat(?) watches. Some Mother World ships blow things up in the background so this is likely another imperial conquest and the unnamed woman is taking her own way out, so to speak. The next shot is a planet (the same one?) being shot at from space.

Next shot is Milius (E. Duffy) crawling with a knife in their mouth. Next shot is General Titus.

More motherships shoot at a docking station. This station is seen earlier in the trailer but I didn't mention it in chronological order, my bad. But the rebels are seen at this station in the earlier trailer footage as well as a Mother World ship and some scribes, so this scene could be happening after an encounter when Kora and Co are done with whatever they were doing at that location.

Balisarius (Fra Fee, with facial hair) is being crowned and tells his servant(?) to pause while he listens to the cheers outside. This could be either a present scene, or it's a scene from the past meant to correspond to Kora's cheering for him in the flashback.

A shot of Kora piloting a ship is paired with a shot of a ship leaving Veldt partially wrecked, so the ship that's leaving and the one that Kora is piloting could be the exact same ship as she leaves the planet with Kai on a commandeered aircraft, though it could potentially be trailer trickery, who knows.

Ray Porter (formerly Darkseid) says he doesn't want trouble. Kora and Kai reassure him they won't bring any. This is followed by a shot of imperium ships blowing up.

Potentially, the order is that Kai and Kora talk to Porter's villager character first for information, they blow up every ship except one, and they leave on the remaining ship.

There's a montage of other really cool shots like Nemesis with her blades, Tarak asking someone if they're ready, a four-armed figure rallying the people in Tarak's world, Blood Axe (Ray Fisher) being awesome, Tarak in a shot with a really dark griffin creature—possibly a sapient companion or a battle steed of his since he's seen reaching out for it and they're in another shot together where he leaps onto it while it's in midair and they fly off to the middle distance. But if this takes place before or after the shot of Tarak captured and shouting is unclear to me, so R.I.P. to that griffin in advance.

Kora is in her imperium uniform bowing to some figure, not sure who that is.

Jimmy says something like a king is a man, and a man can fail, but a myth will live forever, channeling massive Christopher Nolan vibes.

Jimmy is shown in a field of red lights that turn blue, as he looks at one light and changes it from red to blue, and the blue spreads out to the other lights in the field. This could be him escaping his programming, gaining sentience?

Kora and Admiral Noble have a fight with blue energy blades.

There's a shot of the rebels leaving a ship and walking towards the coliseum in the far distance, and Kora is putting on her large cloak mid stride. This matches an early concept art which showed the ship, figures walking, and the coliseum. This coliseum is seen just a few scenes prior in the trailer getting blown up.

Jimmy asks who's ready to die for what they believe in, while Kora and her crew confront someone offscreen, cue title shot.

Through this trailer breakdown I learned that the casting list is stupendously large for this movie, lmao. I ought to update the first post.

Edit: Actually, this bears mentioning that "Rebel Moon originated as a Star Wars concept" following up on ROTJ, centered around a fresh set of protagonists with no relationships to past SW protags. This was done before Disney purchased Lucasfilm, and the buyout paused the production talks. The second subplot we see in The Force Awakens just after Poe gets the MacGuffin, is Finn, who was indoctrinated at a young age, defecting from the Empire after seeing his friend be killed in front of him. Kora defecting from the Imperium sometime after her lover is killed is a similar beat, and it wouldn't be surprising at all if Disney ripped the idea for Finn's character arc from the initial pitch of Rebel Moon and the intent for Kora, but in Disney fashion, they bungled that hard on top of the focus on legacy characters including Palpatine.
 
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Morgan

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Xen-Ace 2021

Variety: Netflix Sued Over Canceled Game Deal for Zack Snyder’s ‘Rebel Moon’ Movies


Netflix has been sued for breach of contract by a company that was creating a game based on the forthcoming “Rebel Moon” sci-fi films by Zack Snyder.

In a lawsuit, Evil Genius Games said it had begun working with Netflix in early 2023 to develop a tabletop role-playing game based on “Rebel Moon” with a delivery date to coincide with the first film’s streaming release on Dec. 22, 2023. Evil Genius paid Netflix for a license, with an agreement to share profits — but earlier this year, Netflix terminated the deal, alleging that Evil Genius violated confidentiality agreement for “Rebel Moon,” per the complaint.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in the Central District of California, seeks unspecified monetary damages. (Snyder is not named as a defendant in the complaint.) A copy of the lawsuit is available at this link.

Netflix declined to comment.

“Our aim is to ensure our team is recognized for their fantastic work, and that we can release this game for millions of [tabletop RPG] enthusiasts to enjoy,” Evil Genius CEO David Scott said in a statement. “It’s disheartening to see Netflix backpedal on content that was jointly showcased and had received their prior consent. We urge our supporters to contact Netflix and Zack Snyder to push for the release of this game.”

Part 1 of Snyder’s “Rebel Moon,” titled “A Child of Fire,” is scheduled to premiere Dec. 22, with Part 2, titled “The Scargiver,” set to debut April 19, 2024. The film follows an enigmatic young woman (played by Sofia Boutella) who must search for fighters to battle an impending invasion by the despotic ruler Regent Balisarius (Fra Free).

Separately, Netflix has a deal with San Mateo-based Super Evil Megacorp (Vainglory, Catalyst Black) to develop a four-player co-op action video game set in the “Rebel Moon” universe, which will be available exclusively to Netflix members. A release date for the title hasn’t been announced.

Snyder said in a podcast in March 2023 that a tabletop game based on “Rebel Moon” was in the works, “lauding the work of Evil Genius’ team of creators,” according to the games company.

Evil Genius agreed to pay Netflix an upfront licensing fee of $7,500, followed by payments of $7,500 by Feb. 1, 2024, and $10,000 by Feb. 1, 2025, as well as to “share profits derived from the Licensed Articles with Netflix,” the lawsuit says.

According to its lawsuit, Evil Genius halted other projects to focus on the “Rebel Moon” game. By May, Evil Genius said, it had produced a 228-page World Bible (which vastly expanded on the universe envisioned by Snyder), a 430-page Player’s Guide and a 337-page Game Master’s Guide. According to the lawsuit, the initial script for “Rebel Moon” was “missing background information vital to the story as a whole and to the world,” and Evil Genius filled in “all the missing pieces” along with “a cohesive backstory for the entire Rebel Moon franchise.”

On May 25, 2023, Netflix terminated the agreement with Evil Genius, claiming Evil Genius had violated confidentiality provisions in its contract by sharing artwork at an industry trade show one month earlier, according to the complaint. In the lawsuit, Evil Genius said the termination came as a surprise because it had sent the artwork to Netflix in advance of the event, the Game Manufacturers Association Exposition (GAMA), and Netflix had approved its use. Documents containing the artwork were handed out to retailers at GAMA by Evil Genius’ staff and two Netflix employees, the lawsuit asserts.

Two weeks later, Netflix notified Evil Genius that all of its work on the project “belongs solely and exclusively to Netflix,” according to the lawsuit. “It became clear that Netflix was simply using the alleged breach and termination to hijack [Evil Genius’] intellectual property and prevent [Evil Genius] from releasing the game,” the suit says.

Evil Genius Games, a Black-owned game publisher, was founded in 2021. Its flagship product is the &D-based Everyday Heroes, which it describes as “the ultimate modern-day gaming platform.” The company sells games based on movies including “The Crow,” “Escape From New York,” “Highlander,” “Kong: Skull Island,” “Total Recall,” “Rambo,” “Pacific Rim” and “Universal Soldier.”



Lawsuit can be found here: https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Evil-Genius-v-Netflix.pdf

Edit: As of the claims within the lawsuit and mentioned in the Variety article, some things remain to be confirmed.

Per the suit, "In addition to Rebel Moon themed sequels, television shows, graphic novels, and other potential content and merchandise, Mr. Snyder expressly requested that there be a Rebel Moon based TTRPG. To Mr. Snyder, a TTRPG was critical to the development of the entire Rebel Moon universe since it would provide content for future Rebel Moon derivatives."

"As soon as Plaintiff caught wind that Netflix was looking to release a Rebel Moon based TTRPG, it started working on a pitch, given its prominence in the
TTRPG industry. This included creating mock cover art and character illustrations for the game, developing some potential story lines, and even producing a miniature TTRPG that Netflix executive could play at the pitch. Netflix and Mr. Snyder were blown away. The parties met multiple times thereafter to discuss the project in detail and negotiate the terms of their partnership. Eventually, Plaintiff and Netflix executed a written Overall Merchandising License Agreement (the “Agreement”) on March 22, 2023, which was made effective as of February 1, 2023."


True? Potentially.

In the March 19th, 2023 podcast with The Nerd Queens (video is timestamped), Snyder said, “The one thing that I’m having a really good time with – and I don’t really know if I’m supposed to talk about it – is this RPG that we’re doing that is just literally insane, and so immersive and so intense and so huge, [...] There’s more coming, but all I’ll say is that it was pitched to me – because I’ve always wanted to do an RPG – like, ‘well, we could do it at this scale, or we could do it at ridiculous scale. And I was like, 'ridiculous scale is clearly the scale that we should be doing it.'

The same is attested within the lawsuit, quote included, timestamped video included.

Snyder's "It was pitched to me – because I’ve always wanted to do an RPG" corroborates EG's "[Plaintiff] started working on a pitch", and his speaking of it on March 19th fits in with the execution of the Agreement taking place on March 22nd. Though Zack didn't explicitly name the developer and sources like Polygon confirmed it was an "as of yet unnamed developer", it was still confirmed to be an RPG of massive scale. A video-game RPG would be not very feasible to produce so timely, but a "228-page World Bible [...] a 430-page “Player’s Guide” and 337-page “Game Master’s Guide”" totaling 990-1000 pages of content is of great scale.

The artwork for the Gamemasters Guide and Player Handbook was made public in May via the SnyderNetflix account, and reports of the TTRPG being cancelled entirely was rumored in July from the same account. Per the lawsuit and Variety, the cancellation was made known to the plaintiff on May 25th.

However, the lawsuit makes clear that the GAMA event was held from April 24-27th, and the panel for the Rebel Moon TTRPG was held that Wednesday the 26th. The presentation was led by Dave Scott, the Evil Genius Games' CEO, and Joe Lawson, the head of Publishing at Netflix. The GAMA EXPO site book was published March 29th, 2023, so this was well-planned ahead of time and attendees were notified of who would be present a month+ before the event. See here:

Screenshots_2023-09-28-16-13-32.png


Source: https://issuu.com/fahy-williamspublishing/docs/23_gama_site_book_digimag, page 82.

There was an NDA in place for footage of the movie itself.

The phrase “lauding the work of Evil Genius’ team of creators,” presented by Variety as if a direct claim within the suit made by Evil Genius Games, appears nowhere inside the lawsuit. The closest claim approximating the phrase is "Mr. Snyder (and multiple Netflix executives) routinely praised the company’s work".

Is it a breach of contract and of confidentiality on the part of Evil Genius?

IMO, unlikely. The notion that Netflix would execute a merchandising agreement with Evil Genius on March 22nd, and that their head of Publishing agreed to have his name attached to an event confirmed and publicized on March 29th, then be present at the event a month later on April 26th, only for Netflix to do a 180 on the revelation of information at that same event and terminate the contract on May 25th shows a series of rather ridiculous actions by Netflix supposing that Evil Genius surprised them with the panel at the event they knew about and with artwork they approved. But Netflix has enough money for this to not matter, so Evil Genius Games will need a good paper trail and video evidence to make this clear on their side.
 
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