For the Eternals, the MCU’s next super team, a SHIELD helicarrier is just a bit… pedestrian. Inelegant. Too mortal. Instead, this group of undying demigods has a spaceship made of stardust for a home base. And, as part of a visit to the Eternals set at Pinewood Studios in January 2020, IGN got to step aboard and explore its haunting, ethereal corridors.
The Domo - named after a character from the original Eternals comics - is a huge, triangular vessel. The routes between its circular rooms are gloomy; the lights have already been stripped away due to us arriving on the final day of filming, but it’s clear that even with illumination this is not a bright, utopian craft akin to the USS Enterprise. The walls are almost obsidian in colour, and rough like rock. It’s practically organic.
“What we really want to do is try not to make the spaceship into anything we've seen before,” says Eve Stewart, Production Designer on Eternals. Noting the unusual texture of the walls, she explains that the design team “decided to do it like the dust that you see in the trails of meteors”.
There’s something more unusual about the walls than their material, though. They’re all engraved with runes, making for an oddly religious feel. That’s apt considering the Eternals are a group with a god-given purpose to defend humanity.
“Because the Celestials are gods and they've created the Eternals, we wanted to look at Sacred Geometry and symbolism from every religion across the world,” Stewart explains. “We found that triangles and circles were particular shapes that come up and reoccur in every single religion around the globe.” That explains the Domo’s triangular shape, its circular rooms, and the designs adorning its surfaces.
“In the walls we've got more and more concentric circles, but we also have our own language,” Stewart adds. “When you look at the Seven Wonders of the world, there's all those lovely stories about how it had to be aliens who built the temples and the pyramids in Egypt. And so we thought we’d make a great deal of the fact that some of the technology could have been introduced by the Eternals. We decided to use a lot of cuneiforms, which we then mixed up with some runes, some Viking stuff.” The result is that the Eternals’ language looks like an ancient precursor to humanity’s own scripts.
Providing relief from the gloom of the dark runed walls are occasional full-length windows, behind which are softly lit terrariums. “Because [Eternals team members] Sersi and Ajak have such a love for nature, they've collected these plant samples as they’ve been around planets,” says Stewart.
Beyond these plant samples, the ship opens up into a circular laboratory room that feels like it was, at one point, a place for the Eternals to quietly reflect on their work. Right now, though, it’s in pieces. Tables are flipped over, and books are scattered across the floor. It seems like there’s been a fight of some description here, or perhaps a crash landing.
Seemingly ignoring the mess, Stewart explains the books: “Makkari [played by The Walking Dead’s Lauren Ridloff] has been hiding out in the ship for ages, and so she's collected loads of old books. She's an avid reader, she can read 500 pages a minute or something.”
This room is lit by unusual glass lamps that feature spheres with extending tendrils. “I worked really hard to find something that hadn't been seen before, and I found an amazing sculptor, he makes lights which are based on viruses,” Stewart reveals.
Hook a left as you exit this room and travel to the end of the corridor and you arrive in the Domo’s final and most imposing chamber. A huge, domed room, it’s surrounded by a panoramic view of outer space (or, more accurately, greenscreen until the VFX team works its magic). But that’s not the room's defining feature. That honour belongs to the towering statue of Arishem the Judge that stands stoically in the centre.
Arishem, sometimes known as the ‘Killer of Planets’ in the comics, is one of the Celestials’ leaders, and acts as the commander of the Eternals’ mission to cleanse Earth of the Deviants. While a static statue on set, Stewart promises that in the final film he’ll be animated through visual effects.
It’s in this room that the Eternals communicate with Arishem and the Celestials, which dictates the course of their centuries-long mission on Earth. The almost spiritual nature of their god-given purpose makes for a unique approach to this chamber of the Domo.
“We call it the Bridge, but it became a slightly spiritual place where the Eternals come together," explains Stewart. The towering Arishem and the Cathedral-like echo generated by the sloping walls certainly generate an ethereal atmosphere unlike anything seen in the MCU before.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has no reverence for Norse mythology; the trips to Thor’s realm paints Asgard as a theatrical, grandiose place that’s more humorous than godly. That’s explained away by the Asgardians being aliens rather than true deities, but this allows for a true sense of the ethereal to be ushered in when the MCU finally puts the spotlight on its genuine star gods. That’s where Eternals comes in, and if the Domo is anything to go by, this universe’s approach to the Celestials and their creations is something very different to the classic whizz-bang of The Avengers. We'll find out exactly how different when Marvel's Eternals releases in theatres on November 5. Tickets are available to buy now.
Matt Purslow is IGN's UK News and Entertainment Writer.
Continue reading...
The Domo - named after a character from the original Eternals comics - is a huge, triangular vessel. The routes between its circular rooms are gloomy; the lights have already been stripped away due to us arriving on the final day of filming, but it’s clear that even with illumination this is not a bright, utopian craft akin to the USS Enterprise. The walls are almost obsidian in colour, and rough like rock. It’s practically organic.
“What we really want to do is try not to make the spaceship into anything we've seen before,” says Eve Stewart, Production Designer on Eternals. Noting the unusual texture of the walls, she explains that the design team “decided to do it like the dust that you see in the trails of meteors”.
There’s something more unusual about the walls than their material, though. They’re all engraved with runes, making for an oddly religious feel. That’s apt considering the Eternals are a group with a god-given purpose to defend humanity.
“Because the Celestials are gods and they've created the Eternals, we wanted to look at Sacred Geometry and symbolism from every religion across the world,” Stewart explains. “We found that triangles and circles were particular shapes that come up and reoccur in every single religion around the globe.” That explains the Domo’s triangular shape, its circular rooms, and the designs adorning its surfaces.
“In the walls we've got more and more concentric circles, but we also have our own language,” Stewart adds. “When you look at the Seven Wonders of the world, there's all those lovely stories about how it had to be aliens who built the temples and the pyramids in Egypt. And so we thought we’d make a great deal of the fact that some of the technology could have been introduced by the Eternals. We decided to use a lot of cuneiforms, which we then mixed up with some runes, some Viking stuff.” The result is that the Eternals’ language looks like an ancient precursor to humanity’s own scripts.
Providing relief from the gloom of the dark runed walls are occasional full-length windows, behind which are softly lit terrariums. “Because [Eternals team members] Sersi and Ajak have such a love for nature, they've collected these plant samples as they’ve been around planets,” says Stewart.
Beyond these plant samples, the ship opens up into a circular laboratory room that feels like it was, at one point, a place for the Eternals to quietly reflect on their work. Right now, though, it’s in pieces. Tables are flipped over, and books are scattered across the floor. It seems like there’s been a fight of some description here, or perhaps a crash landing.
Seemingly ignoring the mess, Stewart explains the books: “Makkari [played by The Walking Dead’s Lauren Ridloff] has been hiding out in the ship for ages, and so she's collected loads of old books. She's an avid reader, she can read 500 pages a minute or something.”
This room is lit by unusual glass lamps that feature spheres with extending tendrils. “I worked really hard to find something that hadn't been seen before, and I found an amazing sculptor, he makes lights which are based on viruses,” Stewart reveals.
Hook a left as you exit this room and travel to the end of the corridor and you arrive in the Domo’s final and most imposing chamber. A huge, domed room, it’s surrounded by a panoramic view of outer space (or, more accurately, greenscreen until the VFX team works its magic). But that’s not the room's defining feature. That honour belongs to the towering statue of Arishem the Judge that stands stoically in the centre.
Arishem, sometimes known as the ‘Killer of Planets’ in the comics, is one of the Celestials’ leaders, and acts as the commander of the Eternals’ mission to cleanse Earth of the Deviants. While a static statue on set, Stewart promises that in the final film he’ll be animated through visual effects.
It’s in this room that the Eternals communicate with Arishem and the Celestials, which dictates the course of their centuries-long mission on Earth. The almost spiritual nature of their god-given purpose makes for a unique approach to this chamber of the Domo.
“We call it the Bridge, but it became a slightly spiritual place where the Eternals come together," explains Stewart. The towering Arishem and the Cathedral-like echo generated by the sloping walls certainly generate an ethereal atmosphere unlike anything seen in the MCU before.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has no reverence for Norse mythology; the trips to Thor’s realm paints Asgard as a theatrical, grandiose place that’s more humorous than godly. That’s explained away by the Asgardians being aliens rather than true deities, but this allows for a true sense of the ethereal to be ushered in when the MCU finally puts the spotlight on its genuine star gods. That’s where Eternals comes in, and if the Domo is anything to go by, this universe’s approach to the Celestials and their creations is something very different to the classic whizz-bang of The Avengers. We'll find out exactly how different when Marvel's Eternals releases in theatres on November 5. Tickets are available to buy now.
Matt Purslow is IGN's UK News and Entertainment Writer.
Continue reading...