Sideshow Collectibles is well known for producing high quality, if expensive, figures. They’ve finally had the opportunity to make something from Halo and their license starts with who else but the Master Chief himself in his Mark V armor.
Sideshow Collectibles Master Chief
This si likely going to be out of my price range, but it does look sweet. If any of you buy it, please take a lot of pics and forward them to me, so I can do a write on it. (You’ll get credit for the photos of course)
-HFFL
Text from herocomplex.latimes.com by Ben Fritz
Microsoft’s blockbuster “Halo” franchise has sold more than 42 million video games and been featured in novels, comic books, trading cards and an animated series. But Master Chief, the “space marine” protagonist who wields two guns and takes no prisoners, got his butt kicked on his first foray into the live-action world, when 20th Century Fox and Universal Pictures’ 2006 attempt to develop a big-budget “Halo” movie fizzled over budget concerns.
Now “Halo” has gone in front of the cameras, but without any movie studio assistance. Microsoft has produced a Web series, called “Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn,” which will premiere this October in five episodes leading up to the release of the “Halo 4” video game. The segments will then be collected, along with 15 minutes of additional footage, into a 90-minute feature film. Microsoft will announce “Forward Unto Dawn” and preview it to fans at Comic-Con International in San Diego during a panel Thursday.
Financed at a cost insiders pegged as between $5 million and $10 million, “Forward Unto Dawn” represents the technology giant’s first significant step forward into the traditional entertainment world. Its backers hope the step will allow 343 Industries, the Microsoft subsidiary that oversees everything “Halo,” to tell new types of stories and reach new audiences.
“We want this piece to do all the things that a game, by virtue of being a game, can’t,” said producer Lydia Antonini, a former Warner Bros. executive who is one of several experienced Hollywood hands Microsoft hired. “When you have real people, you can have real stakes and make connections.”
Produced over five weeks this past spring in Vancouver, “Forward Unto Dawn” is a prequel story that portrays the first invasion by the Covenant, an alien force that has been the primary enemy in “Halo” games thus far. Set in a military academy, the futuristic science-fiction series focuses on a young trainee who will also appear in “Halo 4” and other upcoming games.
The cast includes Australian actor Tom Green, relatively unknown in the U.S., as its lead. Daniel Cudmore, who played Colossus in two “X-Men” movies and was in the most recent “Twilight” film, costars as Master Chief. Other cast members aren’t household names but have appeared in everything from “Footloose” to “Supernatural” to “The Chronicles of Narnia.”
Director Stewart Hendler, who previously made the horror movie “Sorority Row” and science-fiction Web series “H+,” said his goal was to temper a franchise known in the game world for over-the-top action and grandiose plots.
“I wanted to bring a sense of reality and gravity to the world,” he explained while editing the series in a North Hollywood office. “Everything from the performances to the aesthetics should be tethered to a sense of authenticity and grittiness.”
Key to that ambition, the filmmakers said, was using computer effects as little as possible. All the “Halo” hardware — from Master Chief’s armor to the “MA5” gun, Warthog vehicle, and Pelican drop ship — was made with real materials.
“Our hope is that nobody will look at a frame of this and go, ‘Oh, that’s a green screen,’” said producer Josh Feldman. “We built a disproportionate amount of our sets and brought in a visual effects supervisor who won an Emmy for ‘The Pacific.’”
An inspiration, the filmmakers said, has been the popular live-action commercials used to promote previous “Halo” games. An ad for 2009’s “Halo 3: ODST” helped to win director Rupert Sanders the director’s job on this summer’s big-budget tentpole film “Snow White and the Huntsman.”
In producing “Forward Unto Dawn,” Microsoft is putting itself among a small group of video game companies expanding into the live-action world. After producing several live-action Web videos based on its “Assassin’s Creed” franchise, French game publisher Ubisoft recently recruited “X-Men: First Class” star Michael Fassbender to play the lead character in a movie version it is developing. Like “Halo,” the “Assassin’s Creed” movie is being developed without a Hollywood studio.
While the primary business of “Halo” is still selling video games, Microsoft executives say they don’t see their foray into live action as a purely promotional move. “It’s really important to us that this is a stand-alone product that can make money on its own,” said Matt McCloskey, director of franchise business management for 343.
Toward that end, Microsoft licensed 343 to Machinima.com, the game website and YouTube channel. That will be the only place to watch “Forward Unto Dawn” webisodes, beginning Oct. 5, save for Microsoft Xbox 360 consoles connected to the Internet.
When put together into a film, the “Halo” movie will be given away free with limited editions of “Halo 4,” and be available to rent or buy on DVD, Blu-ray and in digital stores.
Millions of hard-core “Halo” fans are sure to stream the episodes and scrutinize whether every detail is exactly right. Hendler said he exchanged hundreds of emails with staff at 343 during preproduction. “They were checking every costume stitch, the placement of LEDs on the guns, and the bevels on the visors,” he said.
But if “Forward Unto Dawn” meets the ambitions of its makers, it will also draw viewers who think warthogs are animals and a Master Chief can be found at Camp Pendleton.
“One of the things we’re trying to do is reach new audiences,” said 343 franchise development director Frank O’Connor. “If Mom watches, she’ll completely understand it.”
– Ben Fritz
This is a long video coming in at over 19 minutes long.
It starts off with the Director, Stewart Hendler, then shifts to Daniel Cudmore. Daniel seems to LOVE being in the armor. Next up is Tom Green who plays Tom Lasky, the main character of the series. Lastly Anna Popplewell tells her story. Being the sort-of love interest to Lasky, I imagine we’re going to see a lot of her in the story. She and Lasky have a sort of love/hate relationship.
Hopefully by now you’ve had a chance to see the trailer for the Live Action series “Forward Unto Dawn” starting 5 weeks before the release of Halo 4 with an approximate 15 minutes per episode.
In this first of a three part article of pics we get to meet the cast of FUD. Titles in parenthesis are other acting credits the actors are known for.
Tom Green (Dance Academy)
Anna Popplewell (The Chronicles of Narnia) Eye candy? I think so. She is pretty. Good actress too.
Daniel Cudmore (X2, X-Men: The Last Stand, The Twilight Saga) Okay, while not 7 ft tall, he’s a GREAT pic of MC. He IS 6’4″. He’s played Colossus from X-Men for gawds sake. Awesome casting here! (and he’s one lucky bastard, as he’ll be known as Master Chief for life now…)
Ayelet Zurer (Angels & Demons, Munich)
Mike Dopud (Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol) I gotta say that he would have been a good pick for an older Master Chief.
Enisha Brewster (Footloose)
Masam Holden (Grey’s Anatomy, Elizabethtown)
Osric Chau (2012) Cripes, a friend of mine is going to gloat over this, being that his nickname is also “JJ.” JJ, if you read this and gloat I’m taking you off my friends list….LOL
Iain Belcher (Supernatural)
Kat De Lieva (no other credits known) Hmm, she turns blonde for this role?
And finally
Chris Shields (no further credit given) A doctor? Hmm, I wonder if he’s a secret part of the Mjolnir project?
Some really good actors in the cast. I’m most looking forward to Daniel Cudmore’s Master Chief. I hope he keeps it as close to the game MC as possible. Looking at some of the behind the scenes trailers, he does. And man, is that armor impressive.
The Forward Unto Dawn is a Halo series, not exclusively about Master Chief, though he does feature in it. Finally we are getting something real beyond just commercials. After you tally up the total time of the 5 episodes, we’re going to darn near have a feature length film!
-HFFL
I’ve not included the photos from the bulletin as I will be posting them in their on article. If you want to see them in the full bulletin, follow the link:
The Halo Bulletin: 7.12.12
By BS Angel
Forward Unto San Diego
When you are mere months away from releasing a video game, traveling becomes the norm. As you hop between states, and sometimes even countries, you learn to love your suitcase, room service, and well-intentioned cavity searches (I succumb in the name of security. Don’t judge).
Last weekend, a few of us were in Austin, attending RTX and demoing Forge by day, and battling jumping, chirping bugs by night. This week we’re in San Diego, braving both sun and beach so we can partake in the annual Comic-Con festivities.
We’ve been looking forward to SDCC for months, because we knew this was the perfect place to unveil Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn. While details up until now have been sparse, the time to share cast and storyline specifics, along with a full trailer has arrived.
As I can finally talk freely about this particular project, I have something very important to say: Daniel Cudmore is a dreamboat.
Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s rewind a bit and cover the basics.
Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn
Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn is a live-action digital series that takes you back to the beginning of the human and Covenant war and leading into the events of Halo 4. It will unfold through a series of five episodes, and will be initially distributed worldwide by Machinima, debuting on its new channel, Machinima Prime, as well as here on Halo Waypoint, on Oct. 5, 2012.
Set against the backdrop of a United Nations Space Command military academy, a group of highborn cadets are training to be the next generation of soldiers in the UNSC’s ongoing war with insurrectionists in the outer colonial planets. Among these cadets, Thomas Lasky struggles with his doubts about this war, and with the burden of expectations he may not be able to carry. As Lasky comes to terms with his potential as a military leader, the terrifying alien alliance known as the Covenant arrives and turns his world upside down. Inspired by the Master Chief, he must decide what it means to be a hero.
Halo: 4 Forward Unto Dawn Cast and Crew
Directed by Stewart Hendler (H+, Sorority Row) and written by Todd Helbing and Aaron Helbing (Smallville, Spartacus), Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn features a diverse cast of established and up-and-coming Hollywood talent, including Tom Green (Dance Academy) as Thomas Lasky, Anna Popplewell (The Chronicles of Narnia) as Chyler Silva, Daniel Cudmore (X2, X-Men: The Last Stand, The Twilight Saga) as the Master Chief, Ayelet Zurer (Angels & Demons, Munich) as Mehaffey, Mike Dopud (Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol) as General Black, Enisha Brewster (Footloose) as April Orenski, Masam Holden (Grey’s Anatomy, Elizabethtown) as Michael “Sully” Sullivan, Osric Chau (2012) as JJ Chen, Iain Belcher (Supernatural) as Vickers, and Kat De Lieva as Dimah.
Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn is backed by a top-tier production team led by executive producers Lydia Antonini and Josh Feldman, former Warner Bros. and Playtone executives, respectively. Legacy Effects (The Hunger Games, The Avengers, Avatar) is creating specialized costumes and armor, and visual effects are being designed by an award-winning team led by John Sullivan (The Pacific). Production services are provided by Herzog & Co.
Office of Halo Intelligence: Part 9
Countless people have been working day in and day out on Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn, with the goal of making it something truly special. One of those people is 343 Industries Franchise Manager Kevin Grace. In between trips to Canada and California, I asked him if he would be willing to provide you with an inside look at the making of this live-action series. He said no. I then informed him that if I beat him at an arm wrestling match, he’d have to write it anyway. I’ll let you guess who came out on top that day, after you read his very special OHI entry…
Hello from sunny, crazy, excited and nervous San Diego just about 24 hours before the start of our next big drop of Halo 4 info! By the time you read this, we’ll have already gotten through the Fiction of Halo 4 panel with lots of talk of the Chief’s new story and the trouble we’re going to get him into, Halo Infinity Multiplayer and Spartan Ops’ continuing story payloads in the months after launch, and all of the scheming we’ve been doing to spin books, terminals, and even our new live-action series into the perfect mix of “what’s going to happen next?” just in time for Halo 4’s landing on 11/6. And that’s just the start for San Diego, since we have the Halo 4 gameplay panel coming up soon…
But Ms. Angel asked me here today to write up a quick intro to Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn for those who just saw the trailer or just found out about that REAL LIVE MASTER CHIEF we have running around on screen. It’s dangerous to say no to bs angel, I’ve learned (the hard way) so here goes:
Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn is the new live-action digital series we’ve been working on in (mostly) secret for the last year or so. The “live-action” up there means we have real live actors,a real live awesome suit of MJOLNIR armor and a real live Warthog to cruise around in. “Digital series” means that once we’re done, we’ll be bringing the show to you first on Machinima Prime (Machinima’s new YouTube channel) and Halo Waypoint once a week starting on 10/5 and leading right up to the launch of Halo 4. First viewing is on us, so to speak, so hey…why not check it out?
The story of Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn hops in the way-back machine a little bit to take you about 30 years in Halo history before the games you know (Halos CE through Reach) to a moment when humanity was fighting essentially a civil war, an insurrection of the outer colonies against the colonies closer to (and including) Earth. In order to keep the officers flowing for this war, the United Nations Space Command set up the Corbulo Academy of Military Science to teach the children of the UNSC’s elite leadership how to lead the war and, just as importantly, how to believe in that war.
The “believing” part is where it breaks down for Cadet Thomas Lasky, though. He doesn’t buy that this is a justified war and his willingness to question the war doesn’t exactly make him a lot of friends at the academy. He has all kinds of potential to be a true leader, but his questions and some physical problems with cryosleep training drive him to finally deciding that the UNSC isn’t the right place for him…but right as he’s about to sign his exit papers, everything changes. The Covenant attack, almost everyone he knows dies and his only chance to survive is to trust an armored green giant he knows only as the Master Chief.
After that, it’s explosions and awesome and huge spoilers, so I won’t go any further…for now.
If you’d like to hear more about Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn, check out the latest Sparkcast, which I believe should now be up for your listening enjoyment. We cover a lot in our talk with Mr. Ellis, so bs angel said we could put this write-up on pause for now to let you watch the trailer, listen to the podcast, and maybe check out the panel steam on the web. Then next week we’ll gather back here and answer some of the questions folks will have once they’ve had a chance to meet the show properly.
So if it’s ok with you, I’ll be back next week with a full report from San Diego and a small bag of answers. Okay? Okay!
Kevin
Wait, did Kevin just agree to come back next week and answer questions about Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn? I think he did! You can leave your inquiry in the discussion thread linked at the end of this Bulletin. And no, “Anna Popplewell is hawt” does not count as a question (It does count as the truth, though).
So I leave you with a brand new trailer,
By the way, if you’re at Comic-Con this week, stop by the booth and say hi. Halo 4 would love to make your acquaintance.
Until next week…
<3,
bs angel
Folks, if you haven’t seen the trailer, please do it, RIGHT NOW! LOL. Seriously, it’s freakin’ amazing. I’ll have more on that in a little bit in another article.
Orbital Space Banshee: Set number 97010
Build Time: 5 minutes sorting, 15 minutes build. Total 20 minutes.
Set Piece count: 204
Minifigs, Weapons and Accessories: Silver Flight Elite w/Standard Elite head extra, Orange EVA Spartan; Rocket Launcher, Focus Rifle
Special Features: Opening and Closing Cockpit hatch, Turret pivots sideways and guns pivot up and down.
Dimensions: Banshee H 2.5″ W 8″ L 7.25″ / Turret H 2.5″ W 4.75″ L 4/75″ / Banshee Stand H 1.75″ W 1.25″ L 1.75″
Price/Value: $22US
The set has 204 pieces. Roughly 60% of the build goes to the Banshee while the rest to the turret. This is an AWESOME set. It is by far much better than any of the previous Banshee builds MEGA has done before. Those were regular Banshees while this is the Space version. I do hope that the regular version gets this treatment in the future. I’ll buy a few of them and turn my older versions into custom builds. I had a lot of fun building this set. Truth be told I wasn’t much a fan of the banshee before this. I thought I wanted the set purely for the UNSC turret that comes with it. However, after having built it, I have to say again that the Banshee is awesome. Sleek, bigger, sexier…er um ignore that last adjective… Check out the pics below for more discussion on the build.
Click on images to see a larger version.
The beautiful box art. Loving the new Master Chief Armor.
What you get inside:
The pieces sorted out. (I find it important to do this for all but the smallest sets.)
The turret in steps. One thing to note in the upper right corner is that step 6 incorrectly shows how the pieces go together. So pay attention to that step. It’s easy enough to figure out, but it doesn’t hurt to be warned ahead of time.
The Banshee starts to take shape:
Next comes the wing assembly:
The cockpit assembly and finished model:
This comes with a great little clear stand to place the Banshee on so it looks like it’s in flight or at least hovering:
The minifigs and the weapons in the set:
MEGA is great about giving us extra pieces. Here is what I had left:
I always try to make some sort of mini vehicle out of what’s left. If possible I try to make a small version of what the set is. Sometimes there just isn’t enough of the right parts to do so. That was the case here:
Summary: A great small set, with fast building time and great bloks to make an accurate build. This set is worth every bit of the $22 it asks for. I hope to get at least 3 more of the turrets for a diorama and one more of the banshee. So it anyone doesn’t want their turret from their set, e-mail me and let’s work something out: sal@halofanforlife.com
Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 medals. This set really is worth the full 5 medals. From start to finish it is a great model.