REVIEW: Assembled, Season 1 Episode One 'The Making Of WandaVision'
REVIEW: Assembled, Season 1 Episode One 'The Making Of WandaVision'
Ever since I was a child, I have been fascinated with behind the scenes programmes on the making of television. There's something magical about seeing how a piece of TV is crafted, and it was one of the reasons why I later chose to study the subject at undergraduate level on a three year university course. It's a subject matter that has always grabbed my attention, and this making of documentary was no different.
We start by seeing the writer's room, where showrunner Jac Schaeffer has been hard at work planning the series with her team of writers. Boy, does it look like a big team. It's like there's every American TV writer under the sun here, and it highlights just how different the writing process is for U.S. dramas compared to British shows. In the UK, most dramas don't have a writer's room as such. Instead, our productions in this country rely on individual writers, and it's that kind of difference between how two countries work that always provides an interesting comparison in these kind of shows.
I'm also staggered by the amount of attention to detail that we are told has gone into the creation of the series. Director Matt Shakman informs us of the way they have mirrored the stylings of each era of television, and it's very impressive. Everything from the lighting to the seats that the studio audience sit on has been made to emulate the period, meaning that the period stylings are even more particular than we were even shown on-screen. They've really done their research here, and so it's no surprise the show's sitcom episodes felt as authentic as they did.
This deviates into the special effects, which during the sitcom episodes are mainly practical. These effects utilise string work to emulate the magic by Wanda, evoking the approach that would have been taken before the age of CGI. It really shows the care and attention involved in this production, as any other creative team would have probably used CGI instead, as a quicker option. There are some visual effects used, of course, for Vision's face, but even that is clever. The visual effects supervisors - Tara DeMarco and Jen Underdahl - found that the purple make-up they usually use to replace Paul Bettany's face in Post with Vision's did not show up properly in the black and white aesthetic, so instead they found a particular shade of blue that allowed them to make Vision's face show up fine on the cameras. The attention to detail is so matriculate and admirable for sure.
Equally as clear for all to see is the amount of thought and imagination gone into the creation of this show. Case in point: the Hex. We learn that the visual effects team wanted the Hex to represent what an old CRT TV would look like if you zoomed in and magnified the screen, and from that they eventually created the very unusual red barrier that we have come to know as this 'Hex'. They could have very easily just splashed together a typical generic CGI portal and called it a day, but no: the attention paid by the amazing visual effects artists of WandaVision meant that we got this very cool 'Hex' barrier.
Not that production designer Mark Worthington needs it, for this Making Of clearly demonstrates that he has the imagination and talent regardless of the huge budget he has been given. It's so interesting hearing his thought process, particularly concerning the look of the SWORD base, and the way he drew on real life examples of army bases investigating chemical or nuclear explosions in order to create a more realistic design. It shows his passion and commitment to the job at hand, whilst still ensuring to maintain the MCU style. I think production designers are often overlooked with these pieces of media, and yet their creations give a considerable amount to the final mood of the finished piece.
As does the music - and we hear from those excellent WandaVision songwriters here. The award-winning songwriting duo of Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez have worked on such films as Frozen and Coco, and they have an unquestionable talent for composing music. Again, the thought processes are truly fascinating to hear, as they talk about how they looked at the use of instrumentals in music for each period and the popular culture around at the time, and used it compose the theme tunes for each different version of WandaVision. Their research they had undertaken feels like it must have been immense, and there's clearly been a lot of hard work here in order to make sure that each song is consistent with the stylings of that week's era. This pairing deserve to be applauded for paying such a huge amount of attention with their work.
Overall, The Making of WandaVision is a truly engrossing dive into the behind the scenes work of one of Marvel Studios' greatest ever projects. It's clear that a huge amount of labor and commitment has gone into the making of this mammoth production, and that the creative team had really done their research into the eras featured within the show. It's a creative piece that truly deserves to be held up as one of television's finest moments, featuring some of the most talented behind the scenes personnel in the business. I think Netflix should be worried.
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What are your thoughts on The Making of WandaVision? Let me know in the comments.
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