#Reflection Of A Hero [Shayan]

[laikaspotlight]

"Into The Wild"

[An article from Empire Magazine]

FROM THE MOMENT Travis Knight first glimpsed an unfinished draft of Colin Meloy’s novel Wildwood 13 years ago, he knew it was a story he and his team at LAIKA had to tell.

Set in, as Knight describes it, “an American Narnia” hidden among the woodlands of his native Portland, Oregon, the book- a coming-of-age fantasy epic with illustrations by Meloy’s wife, Carson Ellis - reminded him of stories his mother read to him as a boy. “It had magic, it had wonder, it had danger, and drew breath from the same air as Tolkien and Baum and Dahl,” the Kubo And The Two Strings filmmaker tells Empire “But it also had this contemporary edge I’d never really seen before. I just fell in love with it.” That love has driven LAIKA’s decade-long journey to bring Wildwood’s forested fantasia to the big screen “A huge part of the reason it’s taken us so long to bring this to life cinematically is that it’s incredibly ambitious,” explains Knight. “There’s all these elements that are really challenging to do in stop-motion.” Teasing colossal battles and audacious aerial dogfights involving anthropomorphic birds and coyotes (“It’s bananas!”), the director- who views LAIKA’s latest as the culmination of everything his studio’s learned since 2009’s Coraline- describes Wildwood as “the hardest thing we have ever done”.

But LAIKA isn’t just pushing the stop-motion envelope with spectacle. Knight, his animators and voice cast (Carey Mulligan! Mahershala Ali! Tom Waits!) took a granular approach to capturing the emotion of Meloy’s tragedy-infused tale. Cue experiments with 3D printing, animators filming themselves to study human expressions and movement, and a focus on Shayan Asgharnia nuanced performances from the actors. “These little assemblages of steel and silicon look like real people with real hopes and dreams,” says Knight. “It’s something that doesn’t always get attention, because it’s not all whizz-bang… but emotionally it is.” Central to the story is 13-year-old Prue McKeel (Peyton Elizabeth Lee), who’s drawn to the titular wilderness alongside D&Dloving classmate Curtis (Jacob Tremblay) after a murder of crows abduct her baby brother. “Prue’s one of those great young-adult protagonists we meet on the bittersweet precipice of crossing the Rubicon from childhood to adulthood,” says Knight of Wildwood’s headstrong hero. For him, Prue is as much a reflection of his own Beaver state upbringing as a spiritual sibling to her magical-realm-traversing antecedent, Coraline. “She’s a very Portland kid,” states the proud Oregonian, relating how Prue’s adventurous disposition reminds him of his younger self and the kids he grew up with. Among the myriad woodland creatures Prue meets on her journey to save her brother and unravel Wildwood’s mysteries is “mentor figure” the General. The majestic eagle is one of LAIKA’s biggest, most complex creations yet. “She’s a miracle of craftsmanship and engineering,” says Knight, who’s animators closely studied the “shapeshifting anatomy” of birds in order to pull off a high-octane sequence in which The General and Prue take flight. Where that flight takes them, Knight can’t say, but their meeting has a “transformative” effect on both parties. And as Knight prepares to finally release Wildwood into the world next year- precocious Portlanders, avians and all- it’s clear to him the long road has served LAIKA well.

“We’ve had to build up the creative tools, the technology and our storytelling muscles to do this book justice,” says the director. “What I love about this team is how they’re always swimming forward, never content to rest on what’s come before.” LAIKA’s new era of filmmaking has taken flight.

[sakurarisen]

Who are you?

Send ‘who are you’ to meet one of my other muses!

Small hands lifted the stuffed chocobo from the floor, quick to pull it to an equally as small chest for a tight hug. He couldn’t believe he’d forgotten to grab it - no stack of books was worth leaving his toy behind like that! “Sorry- I didn’t mean t’ forget Choco-” Or to get so wrapped up in his books he’d forgotten to head home before the sun set, but... At the very least, Gongaga wasn’t that big of a town. The worst thing that could cause him trouble was getting distracted on the way back!

Soft, almost glowing mako blue eyed peeked up at the librarian over the top of his toy’s head. “Don’t tell mom I was here s’ late? She’ll get mad-” Not that she’d be any too pleased he’d been reading about Shinra, but that was something he could hide on his own, books tucked safely into his stack between others on animals and Gongaga’s history. Still, she worried enough; why would he ever make things harder on her? “Choco says pleaaaaaase-”

...Definitely wasn’t him making the plush bird’s wings wiggle. Nope. Totally a real chocobo making a pleading gesture-

~~

Shayan Fair, Sera’s son, from @legacydriven! <3 He’s a four year old born in Midgar who she smuggles out and away to Gongaga after realizing he inherited some of Zack’s ( @honorisen ) SOLDIER augmentations, wanting to protect him from becoming a possible target of Shinra’s attention because of that and his connection to the then-missing Zack. He’s a gentle and sweet, adventurous boy, loving chocobos and his family and exploring, but knows something isn’t right within his family and doesn’t understand why his father can’t be there if he supposedly loves them as much as Sera claims.

It’s a hard lesson he struggles to come to terms with, putting him on a warpath against Shinra even despite getting Zack back in his Remake verse. He definitely doesn’t do well with stress, that’s for sure, but who says he can’t take it out with running around the jungle with his plush chocobo and dreaming of seeing the world and owning his own pet ‘boco?

[wingrisen]

Tag Dump!

[sakurarisen-a]

Tag Drop!

[smokedstorybara]

Mythicals

WIP Intro

Genre: magical girl comic

Length: 8 or 9 arcs

Status: outlining

Themes: identity, love, friendship, mental health

Setting: future New York City

Summary: When an angry giant decides to take control of the Mortal Realm and seals six of the Ten Races in the Fair Realm to keep them from interfering, the King of the Fair Folk finds a loophole: if each race imbues an artifact with significance to thei culture with all the powers of their race, they can send those to the Mortal Realm to be wielded by human representatives in the protection of the realm.

One problem: the Pixies weren’t quite as unified in the cause as they claimed, and the choice their artifact in bearer reflects that.

~

Six children around the world find artifacts that give them magical transformations and powers. Several years later, they meet in a performing arts school in Nww York and team up to protect Humanity from mysterious attackers.

But the pressure to be a hero weighs heavily on Avery, who’s always struggled with malicious and deceitful urges and who’s coping mechanism of ‘put it all in a box and only let it out where nobody can recognize you’ may have serious consequences.

Characters:

Avery - A total prankster who loves to have fun, but also sometimes finds themself drawn to more malicious tricks. They’re out back home in Alaska but not at their new school. Plays the flute. Goth, with a love of dark purple. | genderfluid, bi, mixed race

Rana - Always returns a favor, always helps anyone who’s helped her, but refuses to put effort and emotion into a friendship or relationship that she gets nothing from. She’s a skilled and passionate actress. And a natural leader. | trans, bi, Egyptian, autistic

Liv - The hardest worker you’ve ever met, she’s always working on something; might have a bit of a bad habit of overworking. Has beautiful craftsmanship, is great with technology and quite strong. Studying theatre tech. | lesbian, Norwegian, depressed?, workaholic

Anahera - Always has the best advice and is surprisingly sensible for a teenager. A gymnast and silk aerialist. | butch lesbian, Maori, ADHD

Li Na - The living definition of ‘organized chaos’; she somehow always knows where everything is, has a system no one else understands. Is never late to anything. Has a bit of a hoarding problem and collects antiques/vintage items. She’s very indecisive and would honestly rather be able to choose every option, every time. Does Ballet. | pan, Chinese, OCD

Luis - Incredibly kind, generous, and trusting. But definitely not naive, far from it actually, just consistently makes the choice to care about people and give them chances despite his history. Skilled Joropo dancer and budding comedian. | gnc, gay, Columbian, PTSD

Shayan - Avery’s crush. He’s very soft-spoken and shy, but very caring when you get to know him. Plays the cello. Repeat victim of the bad guys. | trans, bi, Iranian, anxiety

[sakurarisen]

Tag drop~