Crew Members

Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
One of the questions that I'm seeing come up is looking at what the production quality is going to be like, because of course we want to see this get the treatment it deserves. I looked over the IMDB crew list today and I am so impressed right now with their hiring choices. I'm getting excited.

Director: Uta Briesewitz (also credited as a producer), who has directed for Westworld, Fear the Walking Dead, Stranger Things, and Jessica Jones. I really liked the Jessica Jones episodes she directed.

Visual FX: Jakob Chilczuk and Karen Goulekas. Jakob has done Black Mirror, and Karen worked on Looper, Green Lantern, Raimi's Spider Man, Godzilla, Titanic, Apollo 13 and this one really caught my attention because it's one of my all-time favorite movies: The Fifth Element as digital effects supervisor.

Costume: Isis Mussenden did the Narnia movies, and has also done some period films (On the Basis of Sex, most recently). I haven't heard of most of what she's done with live action (she worked on Shrek and such) but most of it does not stand out to me either way (Dante's Peak, The Wolverine, American Psycho). I really liked some of Susan's designs for Narnia and Jadis was pretty cool, so at the very least I think she'll do alright. Hopefully she's inspired by the variety in WoT and understands that it can be so much more than generic European medievalness.

Makeup: Nick Dudman. This one has me the most thrilled because look at this work history. His very first job was Empire Strikes Back and he won a BAFTA for Fifth Element. Like. omg. I'm also a huge 80s scifi/fantasy nut and his fingers have been in basically every project I've ever loved: Superman II, Dragonslayer, RotJ, Krull (my heart!), Labyrinth (!!!), Willow (!!!!!!), Who Framed Roger Rabbit, he created Jack Nicholson's Joker, did Indiana Jones, Alien 3, and then was involved with every Harry Potter. I've watched every scrap of reel on the makeup FX from Harry Potter and I couldn't be more happy with this decision.

Their choice for makeup FX gives me a lot of hope for what this show could be like. I personally really want to see practical FX over CGI as much as possible because, to me, it looks so much more real and has so much more staying power. Plus, WoT has an incredible amount of fantastical and whimsy to it, and sometimes whimsy with a dark side. With this work history, I think I'm going to see the makeup FX realized exactly the way I think it should be.

10/16/2019 Update:

So I tweeted at Rafe and the official Twitter account about hiring intimacy coordinators and sexual violence advisors and look what showed up on IMDB: Yarit Dor and Enric Ortuno have been hired as intimacy coordinators. A bit of description about what Dor will be doing: "Pre-shoot rehearsals with actors to create consensual choreography" and "Advocate for actors on-set: checking-in, maintaining any nudity riders, offering support as Mental Health First Aiders and more." Ortuno works with Dor a lot, and it's possible they might also be the team working on fight scene choreography. Ortuno has a background as a stunt man. Very excited about this addition to the crew.

11/04/2019 Update:

Storyboarding:
At least one artist is Mark Risk, who has a lot of experience in genre entertainment as well as movies and film-- his work has really run the gamut from a Scorpion King sequel and The Maze Runner to Black Sails, Serenity, and Outlander. I'm not familiar with everything he's worked on-- a lot of it is critically acclaimed and some of it were bombs, but this is probably a decent pick. I like that he's worked on Black Sails and Serenity, since they were both examples of excellent storyboards.

Special FX tech: this person will probably be largely responsible for visualizing weaving, so probably worth paying attention to. Miroslav Precechtel is currently working on other Amazon projects, but his background is encouraging: Spider Man: Far From Home was a special FX masterpiece in a lot of ways and he was a part of the action unit for Underworld: Blood Wars so that again makes me think he might be one of the people responsible for making Moiraine shoot fireballs out of her hands ;)

Lighting: The balloon lighting supervisor, Marek Radolf, makes me happy, since some of what he's worked on (his resume is long and very impressive) had some truly excellent lighting: Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy, Inglorious Bastards, and the lighting in The Ghost Writer was a big part of what made that movie work for me so well and he worked on The Grand Budapest Hotel and there was some really cool lighting work in that so I'm happy with this pick. It's starting to be a trend, me being very happy with their crew decisions.

Cinematographer: David Moxness. He's a standby of genre television (Fringe, Smallville) but I'm not familiar with most of his work and a lot of what I am familiar with ... I wouldn't think of as having outstanding cinematography. Most shows don't have the same cinematographer for the whole thing, though, so if I'm not a fan of it I'm not too worried about it. Another cinematographer, according to r/TheDailyTrolloc, is David Luther, but I'm not sure how he knows that. Luther is more encouraging to me because I do like the cinematography of shows he's been on (White Queen had some great moments in his episodes, and so was his episode of Sherlock).

Makeup, prosthetics: Johnny Murphy, who I know from Into the Badlands and Vikings. I haven't seen much of Penny Dreadful, his other significant work, but this choice means that they have someone on board who can do a lot of gore. Like ... a lot of gore. Nick Dudman's style will probably be more influential on the overall look than Murphy's, and his leans toward the whimsical, so it's probably good to have someone on hand who can show Trollocs being burned alive and wolves being cut to pieces. I think we can count on Perrin's berserker scene being fairly realistic, with a pick like this.

12/02/2019 Update:

Director:
Salli Richardson-Whitfield posted on Instagram about being in Prague with a selfie and a well-worn cover of The Dragon Reborn, and tagged it "#directorslife" so it's possible we have a second director! She's got a lot of genre directing experience: Altered Carbon, American Gods, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, The Magicians (including "Six Short Stories about Magic, which was so good), The Punisher, Luke Cage, Agents of SHIELD, etc. Her background is just as impressive as Uta's, so this is exciting. They're getting some top-notch directors who are capable of doing really interesting, beautiful things.

12/03/2019 Update:

Director: Wayne Yip is listed as being involved with the Wheel of Time on his agency's profile page, and given his previous credits he's probably another director. He doesn't have as strong of a background in genre television (he's worked on Doctor Who, Into the Badlands, Cloak & Dagger) since his focus is more in suspense/thriller.

02/28/2020 Update:

Season 1 Finale Director:
Ciaran Donnelly. I think his first international presence was directing 13 episodes of The Tudors which seems like it was directed adequately for me. I wasn't in love with the show, though, so maybe he did a good job and I can't see it past the bad writing. He directed one of the more memorable episodes of Once Upon a Time (the one where Ariel shows up). I haven't seen anything of Krypton but he started the show off so SyFy must have trusted him a good bit. He's done a bunch of The Vikings and two from Altered Carbon, so his career is definitely picking up some steam.

See below for pics of set pieces and wigs.

09/02/21 Update:

David Buckley has been replaced as composer by Lorne Balfe, who has a much more extensive catalog of scores under his belt than Buckley.

***

I'll be coming back to update this as we get more news about crew members. Prop master and set designer are my next biggest priorities after makeup.
 
Last edited:

Arella Mathara

Aes Sedai
Head of the Brown Ajah
Social Media Manager
Joined
Aug 23, 2019
Messages
8,776
Location
Norway
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
Oh, wow! This is great, Aratouial! I knew there was a Westworld connection and have been meaning to check out the crew. I'm in the Facebook group where they discuss alot about the TV-show, but I prefer to discuss it here :pleased-1:

Willow, Roger Rabbit, Star Wars and Fifth Element, this is so amazing :D

The set, makeup, music etc is so important. To me the mood of a show is alot more important than actors. Most do a good job and a bad one here and there dosen't affect the overall production that much.
 
Joined
Feb 19, 2013
Messages
16,243
Age
46
Location
Tennessee
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
Discord
Maibella#7994
Ooh this is really impressive! I'm very excited to see the work history - so many things I love there!
 

Juliya Karisu

Aes Sedai
Joined
Aug 2, 2018
Messages
3,468
Location
BC, Canada
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
Discord
Juliya#2919
So excited for the costuming! I liked the costuming in the Narnia movies, although I hope there are no velvet spandex dresses.
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
[horrified shudder] Oh goddess I hadn't even thought of velvet spandex as a possible option.

This article actually has a lot of looks that demonstrate what I think Wheel of Time fashion could possibly do-- Reign took modern approaches to fabrics/overlays/motifs/necklines and applied them to "historic" costuming and it was a huge win in my book.

"High Fashion Historic Hybrid"
 
Last edited:

Ephrem Elpidius

Resident Citizen
Joined
Sep 22, 2013
Messages
1,780
Age
36
Location
Shropshire+USA
[horrified shudder] Oh goddess I hadn't even thought of velvet spandex as a possible option.

This article actually has a lot of looks that demonstrate what I think Wheel of Time fashion could possibly do-- Reign took modern approaches to fabrics/overlays/motifs/necklines and applied them to "historic" costuming and it was a huge win in my book.

"High Fashion Historic Hybrid"

These outfits look lovely indeed. I could see them fitting in with WoT lore fairly easy. Nice find Aratouial!
 
Joined
Feb 19, 2013
Messages
16,243
Age
46
Location
Tennessee
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
Discord
Maibella#7994
@Aratouial Delafeld This is totally off topic but I just noticed that you are in DC - hi neighbor! *waves* :welcome
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
Howdy neighbor ^_^

Also just wanted to let y'all know I've updated the first post with two more crew members. :) Yarit Dor and Enric Ortuno will be intimacy coordinators and possibly fight choreographers. Links and quotes and stuff in the post.
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
More crew announcements:

Storyboarding:
At least one artist is Mark Risk, who has a lot of experience in genre entertainment as well as movies and film-- his work has really run the gamut from a Scorpion King sequel and The Maze Runner to Black Sails, Serenity, and Outlander. I'm not familiar with everything he's worked on-- a lot of it is critically acclaimed and some of it were bombs, but this is probably a decent pick. I like that he's worked on Black Sails and Serenity, since they were both examples of excellent storyboards.

Special FX tech: this person will probably be largely responsible for visualizing weaving, so probably worth paying attention to. Miroslav Precechtel is currently working on other Amazon projects, but his background is encouraging: Spider Man: Far From Home was a special FX masterpiece in a lot of ways and he was a part of the action unit for Underworld: Blood Wars so that again makes me think he might be one of the people responsible for making Moiraine shoot fireballs out of her hands ;)

Lighting: The balloon lighting supervisor, Marek Radolf, makes me happy, since some of what he's worked on (his resume is long and very impressive) had some truly excellent lighting: Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy, Inglorious Bastards, and the lighting in The Ghost Writer was a big part of what made that movie work for me so well and he worked on The Grand Budapest Hotel and there was some really cool lighting work in that so I'm happy with this pick. It's starting to be a trend, me being very happy with their crew decisions.

Cinematographer: David Moxness. He's a standby of genre television (Fringe, Smallville) but I'm not familiar with most of his work and a lot of what I am familiar with ... I wouldn't think of as having outstanding cinematography. Most shows don't have the same cinematographer for the whole thing, though, so if I'm not a fan of it I'm not too worried about it. Another cinematographer, according to r/TheDailyTrolloc, is David Luther, but I'm not sure how he knows that. Luther is more encouraging to me because I do like the cinematography of shows he's been on (White Queen had some great moments in his episodes, and so was his episode of Sherlock).

Makeup, prosthetics: Johnny Murphy, who I know from Into the Badlands and Vikings. I haven't seen much of Penny Dreadful, his other significant work, but this choice means that they have someone on board who can do a lot of gore. Like ... a lot of gore. Nick Dudman's style will probably be more influential on the overall look than Murphy's, and his leans toward the whimsical, so it's probably good to have someone on hand who can show Trollocs being burned alive and wolves being cut to pieces. I think we can count on Perrin's berserker scene being fairly realistic, with a pick like this.

***
I'm also starting to sense a pattern with the crew-- there's a lot of overlapping projects in their work history, and it looks like the producers are really choosing people they have worked with and consider The Best for Wheel of Time. They're getting good people with lots of experience and huge projects under their belt. It's all very positive omens for me. The only one I'm having "meh" feelings about is costume designer.

With these last few announcements, though .... it's starting to skew male-heavy. Crossing my fingers they'll start picking some other genders-- we might not think it matters, but to me I can see decisions about how to visually show weaving being something easily affected by social perspective. I don't necessarily want to see the same pyrotechnics we're getting in Doctor Strange and other similar magic-system projects, where it looks like the magic is primarily intended to light things on fire or explode. Storyboarding can also be integral to framing, POV shots, camera angles, etc, and that can get very male gaze-y very quickly. The cinematographer's work isn't obviously troubling me in any particular way, but it's very easy for male-only/male-dominant crew to just be the trend and I hope that doesn't happen.
 
Last edited:

Jocasta Braithe

Aes Sedai
Joined
Apr 4, 2019
Messages
8,189
Location
Maine
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
I hope it isn't too gory. I don't like the overly dark jerky impossible to follow battle scenes we got with Game of Thrones. I'm hoping that Wheel of Time's more classical fantasy style will lend itself to fight scenes I can actually follow with the naked eye.
 

Eliza Al'Shaw

Aes Sedai
Joined
Apr 5, 2011
Messages
5,081
Age
35
Location
Devon, England
Pronouns
  1. They - Them
  2. She - Her
I hope so too as Sword play and Sword Training are such an important part of the story, I'm wanting some epic sword fights!
 
Joined
Feb 19, 2013
Messages
16,243
Age
46
Location
Tennessee
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
Discord
Maibella#7994
@Aratouial Delafeld THANK YOU for all of this! I seriously know nothing about the behind the scenes aspects of production so your posts are super informative and interesting for me. Much appreciated!
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
Hattip for @AwnSedai on Twitter:

Salli Richardson-Whitfield posted on Instagram about being in Prague with a selfie and a well-worn cover of The Dragon Reborn, and tagged it "#directorslife" so it's possible we have a second director! She's got a lot of genre directing experience: Altered Carbon, American Gods, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, The Magicians (including "Six Short Stories about Magic, which was so good), The Punisher, Luke Cage, Agents of SHIELD, etc. Her background is just as impressive as Uta's, so this is exciting. They're getting some top-notch directors who are capable of doing really interesting, beautiful things.
 

Jocasta Braithe

Aes Sedai
Joined
Apr 4, 2019
Messages
8,189
Location
Maine
Pronouns
  1. She - Her
American Gods was well done. Oooh that bodes well, I think!
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
Two updates in a row, we're moving along!

Composer: This one's a big one-- in my opinion at least, because we finally have a composer listed on IMDB, David Buckley. Buckley has written music for The Forbidden Kingdom, From Paris with Love (you can listen to the entire soundtrack on Spotify, I'd recommend only listening to "The Ring" and skipping everything else), The Town, The Good Wife, Call of Duty: Ghosts (listen for the horn in the middle, it's good), and wrote a nice little choral piece for Papillon. He's got a list of samples you can stream on his website, too.

Director: Wayne Yip is listed as being involved with the Wheel of Time on his agency's profile page, and given his previous credits he's probably another director. He doesn't have as strong of a background in genre television (he's worked on Doctor Who, Into the Badlands, Cloak & Dagger) since his focus is more in suspense/thriller.

Thoughts:

David Buckley is ... he's alright. He's good at writing scores for suspenseful scenes, good at evoking "spookiness" and tension. I think he's weak when it comes to orchestration since in my opinion he doesn't fully take advantage of what an orchestra can do when he has one. Some of his pieces have been particularly good at creating that sense of nostalgia/longing/hauntedness I think could be a good fit for WoT's audio landscape ("The Letter" from The Town did this and "Myrtil" from Papillon reminded me of LotR). I'm not hugely impressed, but I think he's capable, and The Forbidden Kingdom demonstrated he can do "epic" music so I'm cautiously optimistic. Although, take my opinion with a grain of salt because I've always hated Hans Zimmer and thought he was a hack (catch me in person for my "Zimmer Recycles the Same Melody In All Of His Scores, Here Is My YouTube Playlist of Proof" soapbox rant).

On Wayne Zip as director: he could be an excellent choice for the Shadar Logoth episode, or perhaps if they enter The Ways? This also means they're 3-for-3 on choosing either women or people of color as directors.
 

Eliza Al'Shaw

Aes Sedai
Joined
Apr 5, 2011
Messages
5,081
Age
35
Location
Devon, England
Pronouns
  1. They - Them
  2. She - Her
Thank you so much for these updates. Excited to think of Zip doing The Ways...
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
I have been watching for crew announcements, and haven't seen any more come out.

[gimme hands] I want set designer and prop master! Just tell us who they're going to be, darn you! [stomps feet]
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2019
Messages
378
Age
36
Location
Washington, DC
Sorry for the double post, but it's been a while.

So, we've got a few pics of crew-made things, like a village:

on9vbruw7he41.jpg


I think the main possibilities for this is Emond's Field, Whitebridge, or Baerlon. I've seen people complaining about the lack of thatched roofs if this is Emond's Field, but it's possible they're trying to communicate the Renaissance-like period of WoT and not heavily communicate Medieval (although thatching was used far beyond the Medieval period, it's still most commonly associated with it and public consciousness would see it and think "Medieval" IMO).

We do have a significant set piece, although no set designer yet (mumble grumble):

p8nbkbb2pah41.jpg


I agree with speculation that this might be the Shienaran architecture around their Waygate. I like what this set piece says about the talents of their set designer, regardless.

And, lastly, a pic of some wigs from on set:

ktyzxffehhf41.jpg


That seems like an Aes Sedai's wig in the middle ground-- considering it's Alanna dancing to Whitney Houston in the video, maybe it's hers?

Also, there's a new director for the season 1 finale: Ciaran Donnelly. I think his first international presence was directing 13 episodes of The Tudors which seems like it was directed adequately for me. I wasn't in love with the show, though, so maybe he did a good job and I can't see it past the bad writing. He directed one of the more memorable episodes of Once Upon a Time (the one where Ariel shows up). I haven't seen anything of Krypton but he started the show off so SyFy must have trusted him a good bit. He's done a bunch of The Vikings and two from Altered Carbon, so his career is definitely picking up some steam. My take: he's kinda generic. Reliable, but maybe a bit of a "bro." He's done a lot of action stuff so for the finale it seems like it might be action-heavy, but also at the same time his action directing is .... not special? It's fine, but I haven't seen anything mind-blowing from him. It's a lot of hit-hit-slowmo pan-hit-dust flies-repeat. Granted, choreographer, cinematographer, and editor will have a big influence on this.
 
Top