American Gods wins visual effects award
Cinesite has been awarded visual effects work for a major forthcoming mini-series AMERICAN GODS. This is a significant award of work, which will include the series opener as well as recurring work throughout the subsequent episodes.
The 10-episode series is being produced by FremantleMedia North America for release in 2017 by Starz. Bryan Fuller and Michael Green serve as writers and showrunners, with Fuller’s frequent “Hannibal” helmer David Slade set to direct the pilot and additional episodes. Besides his work on Hannibal and the 2010 Twilight sequel, Slade has directed opening episodes for the likes of Awake, Crossbones, and the CBS medical drama LFE.
The miniseries will be based on the highly successful book of the same name by Neil Gaiman, which was published in 2001 and won the prestigious 2002 Hugo, Nebula, Locus, SFX Magazine and Bram Stoker Awards, all for Best Novel.
The series posits a war brewing between old and new gods. The traditional gods of mythological roots from around the world are steadily losing believers to an upstart pantheon of gods reflecting society’s modern love of money, technology, media, celebrity and drugs. The plot centres around Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle), an ex-con who becomes bodyguard and traveling partner to Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane), a conman, but in reality the Norse god Odin. Together, they embark on a cross-country mission to gather the forces of the old gods in preparation to battle the new deities.
“We’re really excited to get to work with Kevin Tod Haug (VFX Supervisor) with on this adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s much-loved novel with David and the team at Fremantle” says Chloë Grysole, General Manager of Cinesite Montréal. “This series will give us a chance to do some incredibly creative and visually stunning work and marks a return for us into the world of high-end television series.”
Cinesite’s previous television work includes creating Emmy Award nominated visual effects for HBO’s BAND OF BROTHERS and INTO THE STORM and winning Emmy Awards for ROME in 2006 and GENERATION KILL in 2008. It also won a Royal Television Society award for its work on BAND OF BROTHERS.
