Get updates delivered to you daily. Free and customizable.
Cinemablend
How Thor Sequels And What We Do In The Shadows Paved The Way For The Time Bandits TV Show, According To Creators Taika Waititi And Jemaine Clement
By Nick Venable,
2024-08-20
With a bit more fantastical whimsy than many of Apple TV+’s best shows , the film-to-TV reimagining of Terry Gilliam’s Time Bandits is as irreverently wacky and ridiculous as time-travel movies and TV shows can get. Some of that comes from star Lisa Kudrow and the rest of the ragtag ensemble, but much of it stems from the imaginative duo of co-creators Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement, whose past efforts helped to inform the streaming comedy.
CinemaBlend spoke with Waititi and Clement going into Season 1 of Time Bandits , and given just how wide the scope of the story is, I asked them if and how the former’s MCU films Thor: Ragnarok and Thor: Love and Thunder paved the way for this series, and similarly inquired about how the impact of their shared vampire comedy What We Do in the Shadows . Understandably, Clement attributed the size of it all to the Marvel features, as he put it:
Of course, a sizeable budget and massive scale are good things to have for an audacious remake like this, but all are essentially worthless without someone who knows how to turn the money into gold. And Taika Waititi explained who that person was for this show, saying:
Indeed, the Oscar-nominated Ra Vincent is no small-timer. He started as a sculptor for Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Ring movies, moved up to handling set decoration for the Hobbit trilogy and Alice Through the Looking Glass . Along the way, he crossed professional paths with Waititi and Clement, and since handled production design on films like What We Do in the Shadows , Thor: Ragnarok, JoJo Rabbit , and Next Goal Wins , as well as Our Flag Means Death and the pilot of What We Do in the Shadows .
Save for Thor: Love and Thunder , Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Eagle vs Shark , Vincent has been looped into the majority of Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement’s mainstream creative ventures. And I think most fans would agree that the looks of all of those projects is spot-on and right in line with whatever moods and tones are needed. (The vamp’s house alone in Shadows is a design feat.)
Jemaine Clement agreeably shared praise for Ra Vincent in bringing up a series that wasn't already mentioned earlier. And he also spoke more generally to the idea that he and Waititi attempted to do with Time Bandits what they did with Shadows as far as building upon an existing story goes. In his words:
Among the funniest shows streaming on Hulu , Time Bandits was able to pull off some of its wild visuals by filming within the screened-in environments of The Volume, which Taika Waititi gained a bit of experience with while directing episodes of The Mandalorian . It's certainly possible his time on that show would have influenced his work on the Lisa Kudrow-helmed series even if he hadn't even joined the MCU or adapted his own film for TV. But I don't think he'd be going back in time to try and change any of that, either. And we're all the better for it. In Penelope, we trust!
Get updates delivered to you daily. Free and customizable.
It’s essential to note our commitment to transparency:
Our Terms of Use acknowledge that our services may not always be error-free, and our Community Standards emphasize our discretion in enforcing policies. As a platform hosting over 100,000 pieces of content published daily, we cannot pre-vet content, but we strive to foster a dynamic environment for free expression and robust discourse through safety guardrails of human and AI moderation.
Comments / 0