#sfx 372 magazine

[fuckyeahgoodomens]

SFX Magazine Issue 372 - Designing Good Omens ❤ 😊

PRODUCTION DESIGNER MICHAEL RALPH REVEALS HOW THE SHOW’S CENTREPIECE SET, WHICKBER STREET, WAS GIVEN A DEVILISHLY CLEVER UPGRADE FOR THE SECOND SEASON

WORDS: DAVE GOLDER

Invisible Columns And Thin Walls “The new studio is Pyramid Studios in Bathgate – it used to be a furniture warehouse. And unfortunately – or fortunately, because I accept these things as not challenges but gifts – right down the middle of that studio are a series of upright columns. But you’ll never spot them on screen. I had to build them in and integrate them into the walls and still get the streets between them. And it worked.

“There’s all sorts of cheeky design values to those sets. Normally a set like this is double-skin. In other words, you do an interior wall and an exterior wall, with an airspace in between. But really, the only time a viewer notices that there’s that width is at the doors and the windows. So I cheated all that. I ended up with single walls everywhere. So the exterior wall is the interior wall, just painted. All I did was make the sash windows and entrances wider to give it some depth as you walked in.”

GOOD OMENS HAD A CHANGE of location for its second season, but hopefully you didn’t notice. Because Whickber Street in Soho upped sticks from an airfield in Hertfordshire to a furniture warehouse in Bathgate, Edinburgh. It’s the kind of nonsensical geographical shenanigans that could only make sense in the crazy world of film and TV, and production designer Michael Ralph was the man in charge of rebuilding and expanding the show’s vast central set. “I wish we could have built more in season one than we did,” says Ralph, whose previous work has included Primeval and Dickensian. “We built the ground floor of everything and the facades of all the shops. But we didn’t build anything higher than that, because we were out on an airfield in a very, very difficult terrain and weather conditions, so we really couldn’t go much higher. Visual effects created the upper levels.”

But with season two the set has gone to a whole other level… literally. “What happened was that the rest of the street became integrated into the series’s storyline,” explains Ralph. “So we needed a record shop, we needed a coffee shop that actually had an inside, we needed a magic shop, we needed the pub. To introduce those meant we had to change the street with a layout that works from a storylines point of view. In other words, things like someone standing at the counter in the record shop had to be able to eyeball somebody standing at the counter in the coffee shop. They had to be able to eyeball Aziraphale sitting in his office in the window of the bookshop. But the rest of it was a pleasure to do inside, because we could expand it and I could go up two storeys.”

For most of the set, which is around 80 metres long and 60 metres wide, the two storeys only applied to the shop frontages, but in the case of Aziraphale’s bookshop, it allowed Ralph to build the mezzanine level for real this time. According to Ralph it became one of the cast and crews’ favourite places to hang out during down time.

But while AZ Fell & Co has grown in height, it actually has a slightly smaller footprint because of the logistics of adapting it to the new studio.

“Everybody swore to me that no one would notice,” says Ralph wryly. “I walked onto it and instinctively knew there was a difference immediately, and they hated me for that. I have this innate sense about spatial awareness and an eye like a spirit level.

“It’s not a lot, though – I think we’ve lost maybe two and a half feet on the front wall internally. I think that there’s a couple of other smaller areas, but only I’d notice. So I can be really annoying to my guys, but only on those levels. Not on any other. They actually quite like me…”

Populating The Bookshop “The props in the new bookshop set were a flawless reproduction from the set decorator Bronwyn Franklin [who is also Ralph’s wife]. It was really the worst-case scenario after season one. She works off the concept art that I produce, but what she does is she adds so much more to the character of the set. She doesn’t buy anything she doesn’t love, or doesn’t fit the character.

“But the things she put a lot of work into finding for season one, they were pretty much one-offs. When we burnt the set down in the sixth episode, we lost a lot of props, many of which had been spotted and appreciated by the fans. So Bronwyn had to discover a new set decorating technique: forensic buying.

“She found it all – duplicates and replicas. It took ages. In that respect, the Covid delay was very helpful for Bron. There’s 7,000 books in there and there’s not one fake book. That’s mainly because… it’s a weird thing to say, but we wanted it to smell and feel like a bookshop to everybody that was in it, all the time.

“It affects everybody subliminally; it affects everybody’s performance – actors and crew – it raises the bar 15 to 20%. And the detail, you know… We love a lot of detail.”

(look at the description under this, they called him 'Azi' hehehehe :D <3)

Aziraphale’s Inspirational Correspondence “There’s not one single scrap of paper on Aziraphale’s desk that isn’t written specifically for Aziraphale. Every single piece is not just fodder that’s been shoved there, it has a purpose; it’s a letter of thanks, or an enquiry about a book or something.

“Michael Sheen is so submerged in his character he would get lost sitting at his own desk, reading his own correspondence between takes. I believe wholeheartedly that if you put that much care into every single piece of detail, on that desk and in that room, that everybody feels it, including the crew, and then they give that set the same respect it deserves.

“They also lift their game because they believe that they’re doing something of so much care and value. Really, it’s a domino effect of passion and care for what you’re producing.”

Alternative Music “My daughter Mickey is lead graphic designer [two of Ralph’s sons worked on the series too, one as a concept artist, the other in props]. They’re the ones that produced all of that handwritten work on the desk. She’s the one that took on the record shop and made up 80 band names so that we didn’t have to get copyright clearance from real bands. Then she produced records and sleeves that spanned 50, 60 years of their recordings, and all of the graphics on the walls.

“I remember Michael and Neil [Gaiman] getting lost following one band’s history on the wall, looking at their posters and albums desperately trying to find out whether they survived that emo period.”

It’s A Kind Of Magic One of the new shops in Whickber Street for season two was Will Goldstone’s Magic Shop, which is full of as many Easter eggs as off-the-shelf conjuring tricks, including a Matt Smith Doctor Who-style fez and a toy orang-utan that’s a nod to Discworld’s The Librarian. Ralph says that while the series is full of references to Gaiman, Pratchett and Doctor Who, Michael Sheen never complained about a lack of Masters Of Sex in-jokes. “He’d be the last person to make that sort of comment!”

Ralph also reveals that the magic shop counter was another one of his wife’s purchases, bought at a Glasgow reclamation yard.

The Anansi Boys Connection Ralph reveals that Good Omens season two used the state-of-the-art special effects tech Volume (famous for its use in The Mandalorian to create virtual backdrops) for just one sequence, but he will be using it extensively elsewhere on another Gaiman TV series being made for Prime Video.

“We used Volume on the opening sequence to create the creation of the universe. I was designing Anansi Boys in duality with this project, which seems an outrageously suicidal thing to do. But it was fantastic and Anansi Boys was all on Volume. So I designed for Volume on one show and not Volume on the other. The complexities and the psychology of both is different.”

[azariah-z-fell]

I really thought it was sick brain and watching good omens to much playing tricks on me. I felt the bookshop seemed tighter, ever so different in season 2 vs season 1!

It is because it is!!! Is by like 2ft apparently.

From SFX Magazine Issue 372

[itsdanystormborn]

Orient 47 Full Translation.

Orient Manga 47

Don’t forget to support the official releases of Orient, Shinobu Ohtaka and Weekly shounen magazine.

►[Please don’t repost without giving credits. If you use this translation, don’t forget to share the link to this post!]◄

You can find the scans in @soreita‘s blog!

Orient 47 “Shiryuu Castle”

Orient 47 “Shiryuu castle”

TN: Shiryuu* purple dragon.

The highly awaited gathering at the great harbor! This is the beginning of a new arc “Harima’s country”

 Page 371

Musashi: So blue!!

Musashi: So cool! This lake is huge!

Tsugumi: It’s not a lake, it’s the ocean!

Musashi: What’s the difference, Tsugumi?

Tsugumi: I- I don’t know, it’s the first time I see it too!

Tusgumi: That flag… The Uesugi family crest is printed on it.

Tsugumi: Which means… That’s Uesugi’s castle… maybe?

 Page 372

Box: Uesugi Bushidan moving fortress. “Shiryuu castle” (TN: Purple castle)

Musashi: That’s an extraordinary castle

Tsugumi: It’ as big as a mountain…

Manuscript: It’s even hidden by the clouds…

Kojirou: …

Kojirou’s thoughts:  Tsugumi: Lord Uesugi’s signature is written on this picture scroll. Then, wasn’t Kojirou’s dad a bushi of the Uesigi bushidan?

Kojirou: Guys… I’m sorry for dragging you to this place, it was selfish…

 Page 373

Kojirou: But, I want to know about my father no matter what…

I never thought about what kind of person my father was, until now…

But I might be able to learn something in this place…

Musashi: You are not selfish! I want to know more about the old man too!

Kojirou: Musashi…

Tsugumi: It’s alright! Wanting to know about one’s family is completely normal!

Tsugumi: Besides, I’m a little curious myself… About Uesugi’s connection with Koijrou!

 Page 374

Tsugumi: For what reason would Kojirou’s dad picture scroll be signed by lord Uesugi himself?

Musashi: They at least must have known each other…Nah, they probably became friends after years of military service.

Shapes: Jisai, Uesugi.

Tsugumi: No no, What if Kojirou is actually Uesugi’s illegitimate child? It could be, right?

Kojirou:  You are having fun, aren’t you?

Musashi: Anyway, let’s try to find out! Let’s go meet that Lord Uesugi right away!

Tsugumi, Kojirou: Alright!

 Page 375

Man: You can’t

Kojirou: … Huh? We can’t meet him? Why?

Man: Hum… Why, you ask?

Man: The lord can’t listen to each low class bushi that comes to see him. This time,  a lot of bushi from each group of the Uesugi alliance have gathered in this place due to the war in Awaji Island. As you can see…

Manuscript: Take a look behind you

 Page 376

Kojirou: No doubts they are a large group, and what’s more, there are many bushidan…

Musashi: Are all of this people subordinates of that lord Uesugi?

 Page 377

Kojirou: Unbelievable…. All of this people follow him… I wonder what kind of person Lord Uesugi is…

Musashi: Who knows… That man said he’s one of Hi no moto strongest, the “Five great generals”, but…

 Man: What group are you from?

Man: All of the people reunited here are affiliated to the Uesugi alliance…

Kojirou: Well, we are not in the Uesugi alliance…

Manuscript: We are the Kanemaki Bushidan.

Men: Why did you say?

Kojirou: The air just got heavy…

Musashi: Was it forbidden for outsiders to come? But that old man said to come if we were interested, didn’t him?

 Page 378

Man: What should we do, lord Naoe?

Naoe: Hum… A noble visitor will arrive very soon… Therefore, I won’t allow this kind of ineptitude in this place.

Naoe: Arrest those suspicious people and find out who they are.

Man: Yes sir!

Kojirou: What…!?

Tsugumi: We are not suspicious people!

 Page 379

Man: …

Musashi: Let us through!

Musashi: What!?

 Page 380

Musashi SFX: Gah!?

Kojirou, Tsugumi: Musashi!

 Page 381

Man: Lord Naoe… This man is weak.

Man: He’s not a bushi worth being wary of.

Musashi: Excuse me?

 Page 382

Kojirou: He finished off Musashi just with one leg…

Tsugumi: That guy is pretty good…

SFX: Shoom, shoom

Musashi: What’s that sound?

 Page 383

Musashi: !?

Musashi: What the hell is that thing….

Musashi: I wonder if that’s a Kitetsuki too…

Musashi… Huh?

Musashi: That crest definitely is…

Musashi: Tsgugumi: That flag… The Uesugi family crest is printed on it.

Musashi: Ah!

 Page 384

Musashi: Everyone is kneeling!?

Man: That is… The Uesugi family Kitetsuki….

Man: Which means… the lord is here!?

Naoe: We’ve been waiting for you.

Musashi: !!

Musashi: Could this be…

 Page 385

Musashi: The guy we’ve hearing about?

Musashi: The guy that might have known the old man…

Musashi: Is this person… That lord Uesugi?

 Page 386

It’s not Uesugi, It’s Takeda Naotora!! What’s the thief samurai doing in this place!?

Musashi: …. WHAT!?

Continues on the next issue, “Takeda and Uesugi”!

[itsdanystormborn]

Orient 46 Full Translation.

Orient Manga 46

Don’t forget to support the official releases of Orient, Shinobu Ohtaka and Weekly shounen magazine.

►[Please don’t repost without giving credits. If you use this translation, don’t forget to share the link to this post!]◄

You can find the scans in @soreita‘s blog!

Orient 46 “The Kishin of the origin”

 Page 367

Musashi: Kishin? Is this a Kishin…?

Musashi’s thoughts: No… Isn’t this a black wall…? It looks like just a black wall…

 Page 368

Musashi: Just… where on earth does it ends? It’s way too big…!!

Michiru: We shouldn’t get any closer than this…

Musashi: Huh?

Michiru: Look down…

 Page 369

Musashi: …!?

 Page 370

Musashi: The wall… It’s moving!?

Musashi: What town is that…!?

Michiru: Probably a miner’s town… It’s seems like everyone has escaped, though…

Musashi: Do you know, Michiru…!? What the hell is this black thing?

Michiru: Yeah…

Michiru: This is…

 Page 371

Michiru: The first Oni that came to Hi no moto 150 years ago….

Musashi: The first Oni that came to Hi no moto…?

Michiru: Yeah… It’s a legend my grandpa told me about…

Musashi: Please tell me about it

Michiru: Okay…

Michiru: Long ago… In Hi no moto…

 Page 372

Michiru: A black Oni appeared.

Michiru: He was very strong, and…

Michiru: No human was a match for him.

 Page 373

Michiru: In those days in which this strange Oni came to hi no moto… People split in those who worshipped him as a god….

And in those who declared him a foreign enemy and resisted him.

Michiru: The body of the black Oni fed of ore, and started to become bigger and bigger….

Michiru: Those who worshipped the black Oni as a god, made the miners mine ore to create and efficient town… they offered a great amount of ore to the black Oni.

 Page 375

Michiru: Now, He has ended up filling half of the territory of Hi no moto.

Page 376

Michiru: His name is “Black Kishin”

Grandpa: That is how we call him.

 Page 377

Tsugumi, Kojirou, Musashi: Black Kishin…

Grandpa: Yes. In 150 years, nobody has been able to defeat him, that is every bushidan’s dearest wish.

Grandpa: Anyhow, the black Kishin continues to grow and grow… If we don’t take care of this matter, Hi no moto will be swallowed up by him!

Kojirou, Musashi: Hi no moto will be completely swallowed…!? Then…It will be bad if we don’t defeat it soon… right?

Tsugumi: But he’s an Oni that nobody has been able to win against in 150 years…Maybe there’s actually nobody who can defeat him?

Grandpa: No! The alliance’s leader… lord Uesugi Tatsuomi, he will slay it!

Grandpa: Anyhow, that person is…

 Page 378

One of the “Five great generals”, the five bushi who are considered the strongest of Hi no moto….

Musashi: Oh!

Musashi: The five great generals?

Kojirou: Sounds kinda cool…

Grandpa: Yes. The five who are closer to achieve the unity under heaven!

Grandpa: Lord Uesugi will be at Harima’s harbor! If you like, you are very welcome to come!  To destroy the “Black Kishin”, a strategy to suppress the Emerald Kishin of Awaji Island is important right now…

Well, let’s go princess.

 Page 379

Michiru: well then… until we meet again…

Tsugumi, Kojirou: ….

 Page 380

Tsugumi: What should we do from here on? We can’t go to the east anymore… We can’t defeat this kind of monster…

Manuscript: Where on earth is its horn…?

Kojirou: But, seems like that Uesugi guy wants to defeat it…

Kojirou: The old man said something like “in order to do that we must fight the emerald Kishin of Awaji Island”, but…

What does that mean?

SFX: Sigh…

Tsugumi: If we don’t take care of this… Someday Kosameda’s castle town might end up this way too…

Tsugumi: I don’t want that to happen, but… I don’t know what we should do… I wonder if my big sis knew about this…

Musashi: …

 Page 381

Musashi: I wonder if… The old man knew about this…

Kojirou: Who knows… I don’t think this was written in the picture scroll…?

Musashi: How did that thing go…? A lot of Kishin names are surely mentioned… nothing else …

Musashi: Let’s take a look…

Tsugumi: Hey, what’s that picture scroll you are talking about…?

 Page 382

Kojirou: Ah… It’s something that belonged to my father…

Kojirou: It has a lot of Kishin names written over… look.

Tsugumi: Oh… amazing! It’s a pretty picture scroll!

Tsugumi: But this is not unusual. Such things like records of Kishin names and characteristics…

Are owned by all bushidan.

Musashi: I see…

All bushidan own scrolls…

Kojirou: …

Musashi, Kojirou: …!?

 Page 383

Kojirou: … Why did my father have that?

Tsugumi: Because your dad was a member of a bushidan, wasn’t him?

Tsugumi: Or am I wrong?

Musashi, Kojirou: …!?

 Kojirou: What was my father thinking…?

Kojirou: Was he somehow connected to the bushidan in the outside world?

 Tsugumi: Look, There’s a seal on this scroll…

Tsugumi: Ehm…. This seal is from, you see…

 Page 384

Tsugumi: The lord of the Uesugi bushidan!

Musashi: What does that mean!?

Tsugumi: Seals are the signatures written on the bushidan official documents.

Tsugumi: This means Kojirou’s dad…

Tsugumi: was member of the Uesugi Bushidan!

Kojirou: …

Musashi, Kojirou: Uesugi…!?

 Continues on the next Issue, “Harima’s harbor”!

[itsdanystormborn]

Orient 29 Full Translation.

Orient Manga 29

Don’t forget to support the official releases of Orient, Shinobu Ohtaka and Weekly shounen magazine.

►[Please don’t repost without giving credits. If you use this translation, don’t forget to share the link to this post!]◄

You can find the scans in @soreita‘s blog!

Orient 29 “A talk with the goddess”

Orient 29 “A talk with the goddess”

Musashi is pressed between 2 irrational choices! There’s only hell waiting for him!!

Page 359

Nanao: If he doesn’t want to burn at the bottom of that hole, he has no choice but to cling to the kitetsu sword.

However, if he continues holding onto the kitetsu sword, he will lose consciousness and he’ll end up turning into the black crystal itself.

Well, what will you do? Redhead boy…

 Musashi: Shit… My body feels heavy…. My head is spacing out…. It’s just like when I took the “sword’s trial” …!!

----

Shirou: You were wrapped up in a black mist and your conscience went somewhere far away, right? let go of your consciousness that way! If you do that, you… will become the kitetsu sword itself!

----

 Page 360

 Musashi: black stones are… coming out of my body, one after another…

Musashi: But… I can’t let myself fall down…!

Musashi: What do I do? what should I do?...

Musashi: …

Musashi: …

SFX: CRACK, CRACK, CRACK

 Page 361

SFX: HIT

 SFX: *CRACKING*

Musashi SFX: DROP, DROP

Musashi: OUCH! That was dangerous…I was about to fall asleep.

Musashi: I only need to not lose consciousness, right? These black crystals…  are convenient to climb up this wall, aren’t they?

Musashi: phew!

 Page 362

Musashi: I’ll climb all the way up like this!

Voice: You can’t, come hide now.

Musashi:!? Who’s there?

SFX: CRACK

SFX: CRACK, CRACK, CRACK

SFX: CREAAAK

Musashi: Aaah!?

 Page 363

SFX: ahhhhh!!

SFX: SHOOM

SFX: GOOO

SFX: SPLASH

 Page 364

SFX: GOOO

Nanao: The sword trial of the redhead boy hasn’t finished yet?

A trial this long, must be cruel…

 Page 365

 Page 366

Musashi: Huh?

Musashi: What is this place?

SFX: GLANCE, GLANCE

 Page 367

Musashi: You are…

Goddess: … Will we live together forever in this place?

Musashi: What?

Musashi: No... I will go outside.

Goddess: The outside a cruel place, right? It gets hot, and my body melts.

 SFX: GLOO, GLOO

Musashi: …

Musashi: But I have to go.

Musashi: Kojirou and the others are in danger.

Musashi: Even if you go, you can’t do anything. You have no power to fight so, you’ll be a burden to everyone.

 Page 368

Musashi: …

Musashi: … I gave to go back anyway.

Manuscript: How can I go back?

SFX: grips

Musashi: !?

Goddess: You are not needed, didn’t I tell you before?

Musashi: what!?

 Page 369

Goddess: You see… is the same as long ago. You remember, don’t you? Remember!

 Page 370

 Page 371

Musashi:

This is…

Another scene of Tatsuyama town from long ago. I remember… The cold winter when my father and mother died at the same time….

I don’t know what her intention is but… This Kitetsu sword is making me remember nasty things…

 ---

Musashi: Mom…

Wake up… huh?

Musashi: …!!

People: To think so many people have died from this pandemic…. They lacked faith in our lords, the Oni…. This is a divine punishment to non-believers, isn’t it?

Musashi: ?

 Page 372

People: That’s right… Especially Gensuke and Otsuki…. They showed sympathy to a person from a “Bushi household” of all things…! Agh, disgusting!!

People: That couple were the parasite of this town…

Woman: Now that you mention them, what do we do about their son? He’s the only one that survived.

Woman: Who knows… Someone from his kin might take him in but… I wouldn’t do it! A little burden like him…

Woman: I don’t need that…

 Page 372

Musashi: …!?

Woman: You are such a burden, huh…

Woman: Can’t you go bother somewhere else?

 Man: Our house taking care of you? what for?

Musashi: I’m sorry.

Musashi: I’ll do anything, so please let me stay at your house.

Man: Shut up, go over there

Man: You stink, so you’ll have lunch outside.

 People: This time you take him into your house…

Musashi: Please. Let me be at your house.

Musashi: I’ll do anything, so…

Musashi: I’ll do anything, so…

 Page 373

Person: Why are you here?

Person: Why are you still alive?

 Page 374

*2 months after

SFX: Pock

Musashi: Bushi household survivors should fuck off and die.

Person: Hey, why are your eyes on the ground?

Person: There’s not enough food this year, fuck you Bushi!

Musashi: …

Jisai: … Musashi

 Page 375

He holds a stone tight in order to survive, while his ears close to the scream of his heart.

 Continues on the next issue, “Musahsi’s memories”!